64 zip codes. 64 zip codes of Prep students in the greater Seattle area. But that doesn’t even begin to consider the students from Prep who have lived beyond those 64 zip codes, beyond Washington state lines, even beyond the borders of the United States. Several students in the Prep community have had the opportunity to completely be immersed in a culture outside of Prep and live abroad such as Aiden Bilger, Kenji Hoover and Isaac Trius.

Aidan Bilger ’22 had the opportunity to live in London, England from 2016-2018, his 7^th and 8^th grade years. After living in London, and now living in Seattle he describes how the only common ground between the two cultures is the English language. The dense city, and ability to travel to many other countries made life in London vastly different from life in Seattle.

Aidan attended a school of roughly 300 students, which is substantially smaller compared to Prep’s 765 students. Many students at Prep wake up in the morning hustling out the door to be on time for their carpool to pick them up and drive them right to school, however Aidan shares how getting to school in London required taking at least three trains! Speaking of commuting, in Europe the travel between countries was much easier to which Aidan expresses that “this has given me a broader perspective of the world and has allowed me to see many issues from different points of view.”

Current Prep student Kenji Hoover ’21 had a unique abroad experience of his own a mere 4,782 miles away, 6 years ago. Kenji was born in Tokyo Japan and resided there until 10 years old. Like Aidan he shares how Tokyo was much busier and denser than Seattle, with a population of 38 million compared to 755,745 people. Most of his friends didn’t even have cars due to the popular train transportation. However, Kenji attended an international school in Tokyo, which meant his schooling and overall student life was very similar to his current situation at Prep. He shares how, “almost everyone I knew played sports like soccer, baseball, basketball and football just like people play here.”

Kenji’s international school experience provided him the amazing opportunity of experiencing “two very different locations, as well as their different cultures” but also making the transition to Seattle easier as he had traveled to Seattle almost three times a year to visit family and already adjusted to the American schooling system while in Tokyo.

Isaac Trius ’21 lived in Sicily Italy for three years and a big takeaway for him was the atmosphere of the people in Sicily. He felt as though the people in Sicily were more calm, easy going and personable compared to Seattle where “everyone is busy and needs to get somewhere… That’s something I feel I can definitely learn from.”

Isaac has reflected on his unique experience abroad and has brought back lessons from his time into his life at Prep. This has helped him to look at life with a new perspective which he recognizes has made him a more open person.

If one was to travel from Seattle, to London, to Tokyo, to Sicily and back it would be a total of 34,106 miles round trip. While it may be long in distance, the stories of students’ experiences in these places, and many more, are just a few feet away at Prep. Next time you here about the 64 zip codes at Prep, consider the various cultures, stories, and experiences that lay behind those few numbers.