Moroccan foreign exchange student experiences small town life in Lynnville

While it seems rather intimidating, this is just what Lynnville-Sully senior Nahla Lakouait did just two months ago after leaving Morocco for a year-long study abroad program in August.

“I’m really glad to be here,” she said. “I wasn’t expecting Iowa to be that fun, but the people here all are really nice and friendly.”

Despite the culture shock that one might expect, Lakouait was pleasantly surprised with the differences she found in her new, rural home.

“I was surprised but in a good way,” she said. “I thought living in a small city would be really boring, so I was really not looking forward to it. Since I’ve come here I’ve found a lot of fun stuff to do.”

Lakouait was born in Buenos Aires and, after spending time everywhere from Spain to Italy, moved to Morocco’s capital city of Rabat with her family.

She traveled to the U.S. for the first time via WorldLink Education Inc., which placed her with a host family in Lynnville — an aspect of the program that stood to help her transition into American high school.

“My first day was stressful, I almost didn’t sleep,” Lakouait said. “I had met a bunch of people before, but I didn’t know where to go (for my classes). I have a host sister, though, so that helped.”

While Lakouait’s school back home in Morocco operates similarly to an American curriculum, one aspect makes all the difference for her at Lynnville-Sully.

“Here I feel like we have a lot less pressure, and I like it a lot,” she said. “I wish I would have been in this system the whole time!”

Just as Lakouait’s impression of Iowa was different than she had anticipated, her classmates’ idea of Morocco was slightly skewed as well.

“Pretty much nobody here knows where Morocco is,” she said with a laugh. “Some of them are like, how is it in South America?” 

Lakouait has since made presentations in her classes to help her peers better understand Moroccan culture and help answer the questions, “mainly about my home and school and what we do for fun back home,” that they posed to her.