For three strenuous months, Samuel Myat San ’06 shot targets and learned how to survive in the jungle. From boot camp he went on to officer cadet school and specialized in infantry training. Myat San is one of a rare breed at Harvard: the international military veteran.
Many countries impose compulsory military service which young men and women must fulfill before seeking university education. Students from countries like Switzerland and Germany often arrive at Harvard fitter, older, and more mature (at least in riflery skills) than the average 18-year-old freshman.
Myat San, from Singapore, faced two and a half years of service after graduating from high school. And the first three months of training were no walk in the park. “A lot of people come out with injuries, heat stroke, broken bones, broken ankles,” he says. Myat San left the army after two years to attend Harvard on a military scholarship. When he returns to Singapore, he plans to complete his term and work for the government for five years.
Shira Kaplan ’08, an Israeli, only had to commit two years. She knew from childhood that the army would be part of her life. Both of her sisters served, as do most able young men and women in Israel. “If I hadn’t served in the army my parents would have looked at it in a bad way,” she says, considering that the Israeli government does make exceptions for those with religious reservations. But the diminutive Kaplan spent the first month at boot camp, shooting a rifle and following military orders. It was “lots of fun,” she says repeatedly.
ENLISTMENT TO EXPOS
The move from enlistment to Expos is a giant step. Kaplan felt so out of place her first year that she considered going home.
A senior, Myat San has had more time to adjust to differences between the military and Harvard. “Being at Harvard it really is about intellectual pursuits and being able to communicate well with other people,” he says. “Being in the military teaches you a lot of the skills that you just would not have anticipated being in an institution like Harvard: being on your own, surviving in the jungle.”
Myat San emphasizes the impact of the military on his sense of patriotism. “You have to do this in order to earn your citizenship,” he says. He is nonchalant, though, about his mandatory experience. “I think that a lot of people here have something unique in them, in their lives. This is just something unique in my life.”
PHOTO ALBUM
Myat San, a government concentrator, will soon finish his thesis. After the rigid structure of the military, it was jolting to quickly develop the academic self-discipline required at Harvard. “Harvard is the place where you really have to keep the drive going by yourself,” he says. “You do need to have a lot of self-discipline, whereas if you’re in the army the regimentation that you have keeps you going.”
With her petite frame, Kaplan hardly looks like a weathered army woman, but her experience has affected her even after her service. Two weeks ago, she flipped through an album of photographs from her time in the army. “I look at the army with a very sort of...a lot of nostalgia,” Kaplan says. “My service in the army is something that I would never take back.”
Kaplan has adapted to the Harvard lifestyle. After years of rising at the crack of dawn she has learned to sleep until right before an 11 a.m. meeting. Both young veterans have managed to become, more or less, normal students.
