Senior Neva Aliaga Parrado is about to leave the U.S. and head home to Bolivia. She states that she will miss her friends when she leaves. Photo by: Patricia Ortiz

By Patricia Ortiz

With the school year coming to a close everyone is waiting to go on vacation to some place far away.  Neva Aliaga Parrado, the foreign exchange student from Bolivia, is packing her bags to return back to Bolivia.

It has almost been one school year with Neva in Plymouth.  For this year, Aliaga has not seen her family or visited them.  According to Aliaga, it is “a rule to not communicate with your family for the first two months, but I broke the rule.  I come from a place where we take care of each other a bunch and, well, we communicate [with each other] once a week.  They call me or usually I call them because it costs a lot to call from my country.”

Her experience in America has been full of fun memories and new experiences.  Here Aliaga has tried new foods that she ended up liking.  Taco Pizza and blueberries were foods that Neva tried and liked.  Along with trying delectable new foods, Aliaga has gone to visit places in the U.S. which she has liked.  The places she has visited are “Chicago which I loved!!  I loved it mainly because we went shopping!  The places I visited are incredibly interesting.  I also visited Washington D.C. which I liked going to the different places like Cherry Blossom, Lincoln Memorial, and many museums like the American History Museum.  All these places were very nice.  I also went to Philadelphia where I visited the famous stairs where the movie Rocky Balboa was filmed.  Then we went to Virginia, a very nice place.  I really liked that place.  That was a very fun place where I met many people that treated me well.  Last but not least, New York, which was simply impressing, and it fascinated me.  I saw 42 street, and I felt like a movie star.  It was really nice, and I went to see the Lion King show and the Statue of Liberty which was a surprise from my mom back in Bolivia.”

With all that Aliaga has already seen, it is a surprise that she still wants to visit more in the U.S.  Her thirst for knowledge is still there, and she wants to visit California and Florida.  She wants to visit California because, “the stars live there!  Besides I saw the pictures and it is beautiful.  I want to go to Florida because of Disney and the beach and because it is warm in Florida.  It is like a dream I have.”

A lot has been learned here in America.  Neva says that the best part about being a foreign exchange student is, “being able to express your thoughts with people that have a different criteria about certain cultures.  Another thing is being able to go shopping with girls that are from Japan, Chile, Australia, or Italy or learning how to say ‘You are my friend’ in French or ‘Hello’ in Italian.  And learning that by getting lost one finds the place that they are trying to get to.”

The school year is coming to a close and Aliaga is bidding a sad farewell to her friends.  Aliaga says that the best part about being here has been her friends.  After all they are the one thing that she will miss the most.  She says that her friends have, “offered their friendship, trust, and joyous moments.  I will never forget them or my family.  Well my [host]parents[Mr. and Mrs. Gadziola] have helped me a lot.  They have helped me establish myself and socialize with people and to help me with the language (English).  My siblings are super sweet and they have also helped me a lot.  We have spent some very nice moments.”  Aliaga says that she will, “of course miss the malls.”

Not all of Aliaga’s trip has been fun and games.  She has also learned valuable life lessons that she will take home to Bolivia with her.  The first life lesson that she learned while on this trip has been, “to value what you have and that whatever happens in this cruel world the first thing people need to do is get up and keep going.”  Aliaga learned that it is important to value what you have because when she was in Bolivia she would, “go out all day or I would not want to have lunch with my parents because in my country the whole family sits down to have breakfast and lunch.  Then we have tea at 4 PM at the dinner table, and we all have dinner together.  In the U.S. it is very strange to do that.  I really miss being able to have breakfast or lunch with my whole family, especially on special occasions.  You do not know how much I would like to do those things maybe even just one time one of these days.”  Aliaga did not just learn that lesson but, “from this experience there have been little moments in which she has realized and learned many lessons.”

Before Aliaga came to the U.S, she had a life in Bolivia.  She has a life that she will go back to and move forth when she returns to Bolivia.  Aliaga has a “million plans like finish school, then go to college.  I want to move to a different place in my country in which we [my family and I] will be closer to all my family, help my sister with her job, and begin to save money for the future for anything that I might need.  I plan to focus and try my hardest in studying.”