Exchange student shares differences between Medford and Brazil

Medford Area Senior High School has been the host of several foreign exchange students, who had the opportunity to speak a bit about themselves and where they came from to an audience of their peers.

Gabriela Fernandes Luz, from Brazil, is currently in her first semester at Medford.

Luz had a lot to say about the difference’s between American and Brazilian schools.

She talked about the more relaxed yet longer lasting school hours. Brazilian school is officially from 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., but despite the long hours, time is viewed in a much more laid back manner.

In fact, she took American schools strict handling of time as quite a culture shock.

“Here if something starts at eight o’clock, you have to be there at eight,” Luz said. “In Brazil if something starts at eight o’clock, I’m there at 8:30. My school [in Brazil] starts at 7:30, but I always go there at eight. Always.”

“If the time of a class starts after lunch, around one, I get to the class at 1:20 or 1:30,” she continued. “The teachers don’t have a serious problem with it.”

“Here in America you are always running,” said Luz. “And me, now I am always running. It’s terrible, you’ve got just four minutes between classes. [In Brazil] if I need ten minutes to go to the teacher’s room and take things to my locker, I can.”

Luz doesn’t think that it’s beneficial to have students so wound up and forcibly time-oriented, saying that individually it doesn’t benefit anyone, but it may help America as a whole.

“It’s good for the country, but I don’t think it’s really good for the people,” she said. “In Brazil we don’t have to do this. We can have our time.”

She found the mixed age range in classes strange as well, explaining that in Brazil they only have class with students in the same grade.

Luz remains unimpressed by the school lunches, saying of the meals: “It’s a snack. Your lunch here is not strong enough.”

She commented on the amount of pizza served, as opposed to more quality meals, and how oily so many foods are.

She added how odd it was for milk to be served alongside lunch, particularly since no other options are available.

“I remember looking for something else, some juice, but it was just milk,” she said. “And I just thought ‘Hmm, pizza with milk for lunch, this is weird.’” “But it’s good,” she added half-sarcastically as the audience laughed. “It’s nice.”

Luz isn’t a fan of American style coffee either, saying Brazil’s is much stronger.

“In the American movies we always see the people with coffee. I was expecting [amazing] coffee everywhere, but you don’t have it,” she said. “I drank coffee here the first time, it was like water to me.”

However, she enjoys other aspects of American schools, noting on Brazil’s clothing policy: “We have to use uniforms,” she said. “We can’t use normal clothes.”

Luz went on to explain the differences in how universities accept applicants.

American colleges look at a slew of information, such as high school grades and A.C.T. scores.

According to Luz, Brazilian universities look at only one thing: the applicant’s score on the Brazilian national standard test, the Exame Nacional do Ensino Médio (ENEM).

The ENEM is held just once a year across the entity of Brazil, and is open to anybody who wants to take it, with no age or grade level requirements.

“In Brazil they don’t care about anything from high school, all they care about is the ENEM,” she said.

Luz took the A.C.T. just to see how it was and selfadmittedly didn’t fare so well.

“I didn’t really know anything because [the test was not Portuguese] and I didn’t really prepare that well,” she said. “I take the ENEM in, I think, September or October, but I will have to be prepared. If I’m not, I will not go to university.”

Separate from school, Luz misses the different festivals in Brazil.

One of the biggest festivals is the Carnaval do Brasil (Carnival of Brazil), which is thrown in celebration prior to Lent’s fasting season.

The Carnival of Brazil is perhaps the largest of its kind in the world, with millions of revelers taking to the streets in celebration and hundreds of thousands of foreigners flocking to the country to partake in the festivities.

The yearly carnival took place recently, with official celebration starting Feb. 21 and wrapping up on Feb. 26, Ash Wednesday.

“It’s a big, big party,” Luz said. “Schools stop and they don’t have class. Even the Thursday and Friday after [the carnival ends] students don’t go.”

The celebration reflects Brazil’s jubilant and easy going attitude, pairing perfectly with their lax sense of time.

“If we have a party it’s not just one day, it’s like one week, or if it’s something like [the Carnival of Brazil] it’s all the month of partying.”

“I n the American movies we always see the people with coffee. I was expecting [amazing] coffee everywhere, but you don’t have it,”

—Gabriela Fernandes Luz a foreign exchange student from Brazil.

“H ere if something starts at eight o’clock, you have to be there at eight. In Brazil if something starts at eight o’clock, I’m there at 8:30.”

—Gabriela Fernandes Luz a foreign exchange student from Brazil.