By Andrew Moore
with Debra Mamorsky

For many foreigners who have never been to the United States, we are seen as an arrogant, powerful, and very wealthy nation that is driven by a culture of superficiality. Pop artists, cheeseburgers, Coke, and Nike reign the day in the United States, that is until these same foreigners make it to our shores to learn to their absolute surprise that it’s very hard to define exactly who we are as Americans.

“A lot of Brits think Americans can be described on one level,” said 21-year-old Fiona Dally, who arrived in the United States last September from the Shetland Islands. “Americans are viewed as being very big on self belief and arrogant as a country because they are such a large superpower.” 22 year old Rachel Foster said, “I thought that Americans were loud, outgoing, and demanding.” But, after arriving in New York City as cultural exchange interns with the Mountbatten Internship Programme, they quickly discovered “It’s not possible to make huge generalizations,” said Foster. “New York, alone is made up of so many different cultures and little enclaves. Big cities, like London, are much less diverse,” said Dally. And, as 21 year old Anthony Downie soon realized after his arrival here to join Mountbatten on September 10th of last year, “The majority of the people in New York City are actually not from America.”

The Mountbatten Internship Programme, which is run by Executive Director Michael Billet, an expatriate of the United Kingdom, offers twenty-somethings from the United Kingdom and the United States opportunities to live, train and get experience in either the New York or London respectively. The Programme provides interns with a job, a place to live, seminars on history, culture, business and career development; and a Certificate in International Business Practice at the end of their 12 months abroad. According to Billet, this has been incredibly rewarding “The Mountbatten Programme allows young professionals who tend to be adventurous, high energy types to deal with the formative period of change from college to career,” said Billet. “Mountbatten lets them turn their inexperience into a virtue: couple this with their energy and curiosity and you have young people at probably the single most productive period of their lives.”

But the companies that sponsor Mountbatten interns benefit not just from this raw talent but they also open themselves up to foreign ways of thinking and doing things. “So interns teach while being taught,” said Billet, “and thus both interns and their sponsoring companies adapt to global influences and adopt international practices.”

Founded on Senator Jay William Fulbright’s principle that “Educational exchange can turn nations into people, contributing as no other form of communication, can help to the humanizing of international relations,” Mountbatten provides invaluable cross-cultural and cross-career experience in a foreign country and significantly helps to dispel misconceptions about another country, encouraging mutual understanding, respect, and business development.

Having hands-on experience in American investment companies, law firms, placement agencies, and making friends in the workplace give those who participate in the program incredible insights into a possible career and a culture that is different from their own. “It’s very interesting to see American business practice,” said Foster who works for a law firm in New York City. “It was hard to adjust to the differences of body language, and the kind of go-getting aggressiveness here,” she said. “If you are not a go-getter in the U.S., you are interpreted as lacking competency - that you don’t portray confidence. In England, we are not so forward,” she added. Dally, who is working in a Human Resources Department for a leading Wall Street investment bank said, “Any steps that can be taken to encourage cross cultural understanding is extremely important in our global society.”

“Naïve about how to get a job,” Downie, who was given a position at a legal recruitment firm, now boasts, “I have been informed a lot about the law, not just about justice, but actually all of the different types of legal practices, such as corporate law, entertainment law, patent law, and the fact that the dot com industry is suffering terribly.” While Downie plans to return to England when his internship with the Mountbatten Program ends in September 2002 to take a Legal Practice course, he intends to return to the U.S. to work here again, “possibly in Seattle, California or Portland Oregon.”

Downie, who has come to really enjoy the U.S. reports “Americans tell you exactly what they think. The British are much more reserved.” Chosen as an international delegate to participate in a Student Conference on United States Affairs that was given at West Point last November, Downie was one of approximately 140 students, 30% being West Point cadets who came together to discuss issues ranging from abortion to the death penalty. “I stayed at West Point, slept on a cot, and the water was freezing,” he said. “But it was an amazing experience.” At this conference, he learned just how different our political structure is from England. “Here, you have the separation of power where in England, we have a figure head. I was really surprised, for example to learn that a court could decide who won your last Presidential election. In England your last election was the biggest event since O.J. Simpson.”

While here, Mountbatten interns are enjoying our TV, video games, theater and our food. They have learned very quickly that appearances certainly can be deceiving. Those who have traveled here see that for all of our diversities, ethnicities, and religious backgrounds, we are nonetheless a country that is unified under our flag. Downie points out that he now clearly appreciates how “Our separate backgrounds are tied together by our flag that symbolizes the values, high morals and beliefs that has for 300 years brought immigrants from all around the world to America. It’s refreshing,” he said, “to see a country that is so well unified.”