Last month, Christyan Chazares came back home to Plant City with a broader view of the world after experiencing the language and culture of a foreign country – Indonesia.
He was one of 13 high school students from across the U.S. chosen to venture out to the Southeast Asian country and live there for seven weeks. This was made possible through the National Security Language Initiative for Youth (NSLI-Y) scholarship program.
It’s a part of the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, administered by the American Councils for International Education, and gives students exposure to the world around them. This initiative offers various language categories to choose from and the opportunity to visit the country in which each derives.
One of the categories was the Indonesian language – Bahasa Indonesia, which the high school senior decided to select.
“I kind of wanted to just go over there and see the difference between cultures,” he said.
What’s more, he was also interested in holding conversations with his uncle who speaks fluent Bahasa Indonesia.
He also wants to get a degree in international relations and maybe work as a diplomat, trying to strengthen the relationships between the U.S. and other countries.
While some of his group members – or cohorts, were selected from the same state, Chazares set a precedent, being the only applicant chosen from Florida this year.
To be eligible for the program, students must be U.S. citizens by the time they apply, have a GPA of 2.5 or higher, and be between the ages 15 to 18.
“They have to do a giant application process,” Chazares said. “They have to be interviewed as well, chosen as finalists, and from there a finalist committee will eventually end up choosing you.”
It wasn’t his first time going abroad as been to Latin countries such as Peru and Bolivia as well as Mexico, where his father is from.
He grew up in a home where he learned how to speak Spanish from his parents and now he was ready to become trilingual.
In March he received an email informing him that he was one of the applicants chosen for the trip. At that time, he was also offered the opportunity to take part in a short-term program at the University of Chicago.
“I was debating between the two and (chose Indonesia) because it led me out of the country…and would help me learn a new language,” Chazares said. “I thought it would be the better alternative.”
He and his fellow cohorts were supposed to initially meet up with one another at the JFK Airport in New York and fly to Indonesia from there. However, that took a while as some had their flights cancelled at the last minute. Once they all arrived and had an orientation session, it was awkward and took some time for Chazares to warm up to others in the group, he said. They stayed in the city Yogyakarta and each had their own host family, who took them into their homes and accommodated them.
Daily they would start school at 8 a.m. and take four-hour courses, learning how to speak the language.
“It was a top language school, so it was really easy to learn the language,” Chazares said. “The professors were amazing. They used a whole combination of audio, visual, (and) different tools as well. Out of the seven weeks, I learned basic conversational Indonesian so I could get around the city and order the equivalent of Uber over there,” he said. After consulting with his host parents, Chazares roamed the city, trying to take in as much of the Indonesian culture as he could. The group visited the site of a Volcano as well as hammering and carving shapes to create silver rings.
They also took a pottery class and made handkerchief clothes with dye and hot wax to make them with designs.
Chazares noticed that Yogyakarta had a lot of malls, movie theaters, street-market vendors, and that the locals were fans of soccer and badminton.
He was able to enjoy the amenities the city had to offer on a tight budget with Indonesian currency.
“Gojek is heavily cultural as well since they mainly use motorcycles over cars over there in Indonesia,” he said. That was quite the experience – to be able to get on one as well.”
And he raved about the food that he had eaten. Although they like to add spice to a lot of their food, which he isn’t big on, Chazares was still able to enjoy other delicacies to his liking.
What Chazarez was also impressed by was the charitable acts of kindness that strangers had among one another. He recalled one instance when he witnessed a motorcycle accident on his way to school, and those who were nearby the scene didn’t hesitate to come to the rider’s aid.
“Their culture revolves around the community,” Chazares said. “They’re all friends with their neighbors. They’re all really close with each other.”
Since his return back home, he has continued to study the dialect with the use of a program called Mango Languages which provides services through its website and phone app.
Although he’s wrapping up his final classes in September, he is determined to speak fluent Bahasa Indonesia.
He has his eyes set on attending Georgetown University in Washington D.C. to receive his degree in international relations.
His experience in Indonesia is fitting for the career he is seeking, but he said that there are more experiences to come over there.
“At some point I’m going to go back, just not sure when, but it’s definitely worth going back to,” Chazares said.