My heart dropped as I watched my new classmate and teacher pose for a photo in the Nazi salute in the direction of a picture of Adolf Hitler. My other classmates laughed along, unaware of how deeply targeted and vulnerable I felt at that moment.

Having been awarded the State Department YES Abroad scholarship for cultural exchange with Muslim countries, I spent my junior year in Ankara, Turkey. I arrived as the only American student assigned to the remote, mountainous Turkish capital. I joined a host family and enrolled in a public school despite knowing no Turkish.

Three years earlier I had enrolled at CESJDS, driven by my faith and culture in a way public school didn’t satisfy. Studying ancient texts while absorbing current events, I became engrossed in the centuries-old conflict between Jews and Muslims. The prospect of living in a Muslim country, grappling with an unfamiliar language, culture, and religion, not knowing if I could freely express my own, both thrilled and terrified me.

One day in my Turkish school, a classmate drew swastikas on my arm. At first, having heard the murmurs of antisemitism, I pretended I was Christian, but it came out that I was Jewish.

Despite my classmates believing that Jews were evil, this Jew packaged and distributed aid, donated clothing, food and cried tears of loss and pain for Turkey’s suffering during the devastating earthquakes, partly my nation now, my family, my friends.

As I returned to JDS, I wish I could say I cracked the code of international understanding, but unsurprisingly I didn’t. Knowing that my host family and friends cared for me warmed my heart. Watching politics drive kids to senseless ignorance and hatred twisted me up inside.

JDS has especially enabled me to embrace and accept my identity despite the hate the Jewish community has and will continue to face. Even as I leave JDS, my original quest to deepen my faith and seek common understanding still drives me.