Don't Ask (I'm Telling): Studying abroad? You've been warned

Michael Gromek, a bright-eyed, dirty-blonde, 19-year-old Polish student, came to study in America not too long ago. He stayed with a host family in Winston-Salem, N.C. You would have thought that Gromek's experience would be one of a lifetime. The Triad area is a wonderful place in which to study, work, play and live. Gromek surely wasn't alone, either; many Triad schools, including UNCG, have large groups of international students and he surely could have found some college-aged friends around the area.

Gromek's experience was, unfortunately, a "living hell." He was placed with a fundamentalist, radical, right-wing Christian host family. When he met them for the first time at the airport, Gromek found out immediately what was so wrong with this family.

"Child, our Lord sent you half-way around the world to bring you to us."

According to Gromek, that is the very first thing he heard from them. As it turns out, the family had applied to be a host family for a Polish student because they had already begun to build a Baptist church in his homeland. The family wanted him to be the one to return to Poland and finish their work.

"It was God's will, they said. They tried to slip the topic casually into conversation, but it really shocked me - I realized that was the only reason they had welcomed me into their family," said Gromek. "They had already started construction work in Krakow - I was to help them with translations and with spreading their faith via the media."

Gromek politely tried to tell his host family he wasn't interested. He politely tried attempting to respect them and have them respect him in return. They tried forcing him to go to church every Sunday and the one Sunday he refused to go, the host family refused to let him have any coffee that morning, as some sort of punishment.

After four months, Gromek requested that he be transferred to a new host family. When his right-wing Christian family found out, the behavior was far from "Christian."

"From that moment on, I counted the days," said Gromek, "The two months that followed my decision were hell. My host parents detested me. There were constant rows. I could sense that they just wanted to get rid of me. They didn't know what to do with me any more."

Gromek finally got his new host family, after an appalling two month wait. He describes his new host family as more friend-like than parent-like and he enjoyed the rest of his time in America.

It just boggles my mind to think that people like those Gromek experienced really exist in the world. I'm sure there is some valid reason for their whacked out behavior, maybe like insanity or something.

Gromek's story serves as a perfect example as to how crazy fundamentalist, right-wing Christians can be. Unlike your mainstream, average American citizen who just happens to be Christian, these people live in a world of their own making, a world imagined up out of the pages of a book they really don't understand.

Right-wing Christians like those symbolized by the host family just cannot understand the concept that other people might actually disagree with what they say and believe. They are so wrapped up in what they think is right and holy and "godly" that they forget other people have their own beliefs, their own standards and their own opinions as to how the world should work.

If God really wanted all of us to act the same, think the same and believe the same, then God would have made us all exactly the same. The fact that God made us all different and with our own unique experiences, beliefs and varieties of opinions shows us that God is a god who enjoys diversity.

It is a shame Gromek's first real-time impression of America was one of such crazed, fundamentalist insanity. I feel for him and I'm glad he got out of it. I also feel for all the people in America - and around the world - who are forced to grow up in families like these. It's too bad that some people have taken the Word of God and twisted it beyond recognition, just so they can use it to further their own crazed and definitely non-Christian goals and fantasies.

So, you have been warned. If you plan on studying abroad and you will be staying with a host family, you'd better check out exactly who that family is so you don't get stuck in the same, horrifying situation as Gromek.

Read more from Matt at his blog:

http://www.matthillnc.com