Two decades ago, I taught in an American international boarding school in Switzerland with some 300 students from over 40 countries. Despite the mixing of cultures, it was fascinating to watch how, in the dining hall, one table would inevitably fill up with Russian speakers, while others became the tables for Arabic, Japanese, Chinese, Italian, Turkish, German, Spanish, French, and Portuguese. Living away from home and surrounded by diversity in classrooms and dorms, many students were drawn magnetically to a table where they could speak in their native tongue. This provided a counterbalance to speaking English in school all day, keeping students connected and comfortable. And observing these students interact according to their cultural norms and styles was a study in diversity.
