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Phillip Compton '80 – Ukraine
In October 2005, he traveled to Khmelnitsky, Ukraine, where he played an organ recital in that city's Filharmony. He traveled there last year, too, playing for the Ukraine International Music Festival in Khmelnitsky and Kamyanets-Podilsky.

Alice Farrell ’80 – United Kingdom
She writes about her summer abroad experience with the SU summer program at Oxford in 1979:
Setting off on the adventure of the summer-abroad program, I had no idea how enriching, enlightening and just plain fun this experience was going to be. Upon arriving in London, my wildest dreams came true with a week of intensive theatre-going and touring about the various museums of the city in preparation for the courses that lay ahead for us in Oxford.

The history and legend of the city and colleges of Oxford were almost overwhelming in grandeur. Dinners taken in the dining halls, now made so commonplace by the modern legend of Harry Potter, were quite something to get used to.

Our group from Susquehanna included students from other schools around the country and augmenting the teaching staff from SU were many noted scholars from the ranks of the Oxford professors. Most memorably I was totally inspired by the lectures given by Gareth Lloyd Evans, a noted British theatre and literary critic, who really pushed us to delve deeper into the works that we were reading – something has helped me in all my analysis over the course of my working life.

Accompanying us on this journey was one of my SU mentors, Bruce Nary, who was teaching the course on British Theatre, and his delightful wife, Dorla. They were a constant source of interesting anecdotal experience that they had accumulated on their many trips to Britain, and especially so on our trip to Stratford-Upon-Avon, where we had the opportunity to see a pre-Ghandi Ben Kingsley and the incomparable Dame Judi Dench in an incredible production of Shakespeare's "Cymbeline." We all shared many wonderful side trips as well, including an impressive performance of a Benjamin Britten masterwork in one of the majestic cathedrals thanks to one of the fellows from the SU music department who was teaching a course on the history of British pipe organs.

Most memorable of all has to be the two life-long friends that I made on the trip. Janine Peake, a student from Virginia was there for the business and history courses, and Sabina Deitrick from Penn who was also there for the business program. Both of these woman have been present in my life ever since, and Janine and I even shared our first apartment in New York City together. Janine has gone on to a stellar career in banking in London, settling there with her husband and two daughters, while Sabina has gone on to a professorship in urban planning and statistics at University of Pittsburgh, where she lives with her husband and adorable son. The summer we all spent together, at such a formative stage in all of our lives as far as deciding the future paths of our lives, and afforded us an invaluable opportunity to see the limitless possibilities available to us.

I am so grateful to all involved with the SU summer abroad program, providing an enriching and exciting experience that has remained with me long after.

Gaetan Lambiase ’80 -- United Kingdom
He worked in London, England from 1994-1997 as director of marketing and sales, United Kingdom, with Kodak. Prior to that assignment, he managed a team of marketing managers located throughout Latin America.

Rhonda Bowen ’81 – Germany
She owns Bowen's English Language Learning Services in Meerbusch, Germany. The language and management training service, which she founded in 1988 now delivers teaches seminars in Germany, France, Belgium Switzerland, and Singapore.

On the Web: www.bells-online.de

Randy Marthins ’83 – Mexico
He shared an international experience via e-mail: “I dropped out of SU to surf in Mexico for 3 months.”

Sue Magrowski ’84 –- Vietnam
In 1995, my husband and I traveled to Hanoi, Vietnam, and its rural outskirts for about two weeks to adopt our son, Ben, now 10 years old.

If someone had said when I was at SU that I'd be traveling to southeast Asia in another few years, I never would have believed them! It was a once-in-a-lifetime, totally unforgettable experience at many levels. It was at SU that I first began developing the attitude of "nothing's impossible, especially when you have the support of your family, your friends and your God." Adopting Ben seemed impossible in many ways – financially, emotionally and more. But we did it!

Lucas J. Hamilton ’85 –- Germany
I've recently returned from Munich where I completed several new courses in hygrothermal modeling. These advanced courses were being taught for the first time. This event was hosted by the Fraunhofer Institut Fur Bauphysik in Holzkirchen, Germany. Daytime courses focused on the computerized simulation of coupled transient heat/moisture transfer in building assemblies and evening sessions lost focus in the local bier gartens (it was coincidentally Oktoberfest.) Why is it that moments of clarity and insight into of what is really going on behind the curtains of our physical world are often followed by liters of beer? Twenty years on and knowledge is still scary.

Gerald J. Price ’85 –- Kuwait, Iraq
In my most recent travels, I was deployed to Kuwait and Iraq in 2003 as part of a Heavy Air Detachment from Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 21, a construction unit in the United States Naval Reserve also known as the "Seabees." Along with my current job as a chief geologist with Kaufman Engineering, Inc. in Scranton, Pa., I hold the rank of E-7, EAC(SCW), a chief petty officer in the Navy Seabees.

While deployed to Kuwait and Iraq our main tasking focused on temporary base upgrades and humanitarian aid. We worked with local Iraqi leaders to rebuild schools, create water supplies, upgrade police and traffic stations, and rebuild long neglected infrastructure. I worked on many of these projects in the towns of Umm Qasr, located along the boarder of Kuwait and Iraq and As Samawah. Again I found that the universal language of science and engineering were present. I worked closely with Iraqi engineers to develop leach fields for municipal wastes. These fields were designed as a temporary solution to allow the treatment facilities to be repaired and upgraded and brought back on line. This was quite an experience in many ways. I was deployed for a bit over six months.

Jacqueline Parent ’86 Roncalli – France and The Netherlands
I moved to Paris, France, in December 2004, with my husband, Lance, and daughters Samantha and Caroline. This is my second time living in Europe. Lance and I lived in Amsterdam, The Netherlands from 1992 to 1996. Our older daughter Samantha was born in 1994 and lived there for two years.

In the summer of 1991 Lance was offered a position in Europe. At the time we weren't married, and neither of us had ever been outside the United States. Our response was to quickly get married and move to a place where we didn't speak the language or know the culture. Those four years are some of the best memories of my life. We just spent our daughter Caroline's eighth birthday in Amsterdam. Her birthday request was to drive from Paris to Amsterdam and spend the weekend riding bikes. Three days biking around Amsterdam was a reminder to never stop taking risks.

In the summer of 2004 my family was on vacation in Breckenridge, Colorado. It was there that we decided once again to take the opportunity to live in Europe. My husband’s job takes him to Europe and Asia often! We decided, as a family, to move for one year to Paris in order to be together more and to share an experience that we thought was worth the risk. Our year is now coming to an end, and I know that coming here was a gift we will all share forever.

Living abroad has been a great education... If the opportunity ever presents itself I would advise anyone to grab it. Leaving the United States is a wonderful way to be reminded of all that the U.S. means to you.

Kathryn Kissinger ’86 Snowe – Brazil
In October, 2004, I was part of a Rotary International humanitarian mission to the state of Minas Gerais, Brazil. I was part of an 80-person group from the United States, Denmark and Great Britain. We delivered 14 different humanitarian grants, ranging from arts & crafts supplies to 15-passenger vans. My Rotary Club, West York, Pa., donated a dental office to a school for disabled children. The children’s conditions varied widely, from blindness or deafness to cerebral palsy and serious genetic disorders.

In planning for the mission, I learned that two other participants were SU alums: Mike Yohe ’62 Katherine (Kay) Beard ’68 McClenathan. She is also the parent of a 2005 graduate. Mike and Kay worked with our eye exam group. That group examined over 2,700 sets of eyes in 10 days, providing prescription glasses, reading glasses and sunglasses to many in poor communities.

My mother, Alice Kissinger P’86, P’89, accompanied a group that worked to refurbish a nearly-condemned hospital while providing an x-ray machine and an ultrasound machine. The prospect of new hospital equipment motivated the local townsfolk to donate the building supplies. They had been refused by the government, who wanted to close the hospital. The next closest hospital was several hours away, in a town where most residents did not own cars.

Even though we worked very hard, the Brazilian Rotarians insisted we have a day of rest. They provided us with a tour of a gold mine and a barbecue at the country home of a club member. We were treated to all sorts of grilled meats, typical side dishes and fruits.

In all, we delivered about $250,000 of aid. It was an extremely rewarding trip, and we forged many new friendships. We also improved some peoples’ opinions of the United States. Brazilians in general are not happy about the U.S. presence in Iraq, and they are very unhappy with U.S. immigration policy. It is very expensive, and VERY difficult, for Brazilian citizens to obtain visas to visit the U.S. By learning more about us as individuals, some of those we met changed their minds about the U.S.

Read a profile that appeared in the Spring 2005 issue of Susquehanna Today: http://www.susqu.edu/today/spring05/profiles.htm#yohe

Chris Wilkens ’86 and family

Chris Wilkens ’86 –- Hong Kong, Singapore and China
I, along with my wife, Kim, and children Kelly, age 13, and Brian, age 11, have been living in Asia since 1998. My company, Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi, Ltd. posted me to Hong Kong in 1998 for what was initially intended to be a "two- or three-year assignment." We spent three great years there enjoying work, life and travel around Asia Pacific. One of our most memorable trips was 10 days in China, which included a visit to the Great Wall and a tour of the Terracotta Warriors in Xian.

After three years in Hong Kong, we were transferred to Singapore in 2001 for another two- to three-year assignment. Singapore is a much different place than Hong Kong, but we like it equally as well. Again, we've enjoyed the diverse cultures here and have been able to travel to many interesting places in the region.

In August 2004, Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi offered me a great opportunity to start a new business unit in Shanghai. I'm currently working there, but my family remains in Singapore while the children attend the Singapore American School.

So, I can say that I am in the eighth year of an original two- to three-year assignment...and still enjoying it! ((The attached picture was taken in Angkor Wat, Cambodia in 2004.))

Marilyn G. Pray-Grant ’88 – United Kingdom
I met my husband, who is from England, in 1991 while he was visiting the lab I was in at Brandeis University in Waltham, Mass. He was a Ph.D. candidate in immunology at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden. I moved to Stockholm in January 1992 to be with him and entered graduate school at Stockholm University, where I completed my master's degree in physiology in 1994. It was one of the most exciting times in my life and I loved living abroad. While in Sweden, I was sent to a meeting in Austria to present my graduate work. I also had the opportunity to travel to many other European countries including the Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, France, and England. Of course, my husband , children, and I are frequent visitors to England and France to visit family.

Linda Davis Pizzico ’89 – Kenya, Lesotho, Namibia, South Africa, Uganda, Zambia
I have recently returned from South Africa. I am a film producer (among other things) and traveled with a film crew to Johannesburg and Ladysmith, South Africa, Lesotho, Kenya, and Uganda to cover the story of AIDS in Africa, more specifically the plight of women and children in what many call the forgotten corner of the world. Last year, I also traveled to Namibia, Zambia and Lesotho for the same cause. It was quite an experience and the lessons I have learned about the human race, most especially the amazing people I met throughout my journey have been absolutely priceless.

I have been a guest on television (Jane Pauley Show on NBC, local television programs) to discuss my experiences and also share my experience with young children in a local school system so that they can learn about other areas of the world.

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