Reyane Mbaye ’14 is one of Amherst’s international students. She was born in Senegal, and lived there until she was fifteen. At age fifteen, she moved to Nairobi, Kenya. She went to a British school in Nairobi her sophomore year of high school. “It was very British, with a headmistress with crazy hair, and uniforms, and all that crap. The headmistress never left her office without an umbrella, because of the sun.”
Junior year, Reyane went to the International School of Kenya, “a nice way of saying the American school of Kenya”. Half of the students were Americans, 25% were Kenyans, and the remaining 25% percent was made up of people from all over the world. “There were kids from Israel, Nepal, and all over Africa.” ISK is an expensive school, but many of the students’ parents are diplomats, so the embassies of the countries that require them to be in Nairobi pay for their education. In Reyane’s case, her family moved to Kenya because of her mom’s job as a policy coordinator for Action Aid, and Action Aid covered her tuition. On an interesting side note, her mom now works for International Planned Parenthood.
60 out of the 80 students in Reyane’s class, Reyane included, took part in the International Baccalaureate (IB). The IB is a program in which you take six subjects and spend an allotted amount of time doing community service, athletics, and arts. “It’s really hard, but it makes you well-rounded. Colleges recognize and respect how difficult the program is.” At the end of your two years in the IB program, you have to take a month of exams in the subjects you have been studying.
Despite the difficulty of IB, Reyane loved her high school experience. She liked how small the school is, “because we were all really close. We would all party together.” She also loved the ISK campus. “There are palm trees everywhere, and everyone eats outside. But kites (these really massive birds) will swoop down and steal your food if you aren’t paying attention. If someone leaves her food unattended, you can see a kite swooping in from a mile away.”
Nairobi is a fun city to live in. “The nightlife is amazing. There are clubs everywhere. There is the issue of security, and a lot of people get mugged. But if you’re careful and don’t walk on the wrong streets, it’s lots of fun.” Reyane and her friends would go clubbing most weekends when they were in high school. The drinking age is 18, as is the driving age, but these laws are not as rigidly enforced in Nairobi as they are in the US. “Senior year a lot of my friends took to going to Casinos. If they made a profit they would buy everyone drinks at the end of the night.”
Reyane lives in an apartment inside a compound. Most people in Nairobi live in apartment buildings or compounds because living in an isolated house is a security risk. “I love the compound where we live. It’s close to the shopping malls, and from our apartment we have a view of the compound pool and gardens.”
Reyane’s favorite thing about the US is the focus on individuality. “In the US there’s a fostering of individuality and being different from others. I also felt this when I was at the American school in Nairobi. I come from a place where you can’t be the girl with blue hair, or with different opinions. In Africa you don’t want to stand out too much. You have to be very respectful all the time. I didn’t fit in with that, because I dress how I want to dress and I say what I think. You don’t have to follow other people in America. The US encourages individual thought. You’re encouraged to disagree, and I like that.”
At Amherst, Reyane works in the library. “I’m the surly girl behind the desk.” She goes to class sometimes, and enjoys hanging out and eating with her friends. She is also an avid nap taker. “What can I say? I’m a night person.”
This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Amherst chapter and does not reflect the views of Her Campus.