Summer Travel Offers Work, Study Chances

European artisans, merchants, and financeers still look forward to the summer influx of American tourists, but no longer with the wild abandon of the never-never days. With the rising percentage of students in the tourist crowd, the innocents abroad are becoming discriminate as to where they'll lose their innocence, and in what manner.

The outburst of post-war maturity and frugality among the younger Americans carries some conditions. Those who drank pink champagne on the decks of the Normandie in '39 will tell you it isn't the same anymore. They are right. Their studied gaiety and extravagance has been replaced by a new desire to learn and appreciate, and, even more important, to leave a good impression of the United States with the European people.

Boosted by the believe-it-or-not feeling that this is the last chance to see Europe before it all turns into atomic dust, travel figures are expected to set a record. With this in mind, airline, ship, and tourist agencies of all sizes and descriptions are offering, particularly to students, a variety of cut-rate package deals. Some are hokum, some are not.

The best way to weed through the list of bargains is to work through a student organization, such as the National Student Association. A worldwide group formed in 1947, the N.S.A. reports on the "deals" as encountered by its members. N.S.A. literature, bearing an appropriate "tours but not tourists" on the frontispiece, is available at Phillips Brook House.

Both the airlines and the ship companies are offering reduced rates for student travel. As of May 1, the new transatlantic coach service will be put into operation. Round-trip fares are scheduled for; New York-London, $486; Amsterdam, $522; Copenhagen, $563.60; Paris, $522; Zurich, $563.60. Sponsors include almost every major line. Take your pick from Air France, KLM, Sabena, Swissair, BOAC, Scandinavian Airways System, PAA, and T.W.A.

The Netherlands government has replaced the S. S. Volendam, formerly an all-student liner, with the S. S. Grote Beer and the S. S. Zuiderkrus, which sail from New York on June 30 and July 5 and from Rotterdam, September 3 and 4. Cabin space sells for $360 per round trip, while the less squeamish can obtain dormitory banking for $200. Since the pleasantly tarnished reputation of the Volendam is universal, accommodations will be hard to find. An attempt can be made, however, by writing to the Netherlands Office for Foreign Students Relations, 48 West 48 St., New York.

Regardless of political and social change, the grand illusion still persists that students can find work in Europe, thereby financing travel expenditures.

The only method of securing work is through good personal contacts in a specialized field, and even then the chances are slim. The student-sponsored work camps will give anyone a nice clean conscience and a wealth of ruddy friends, although their financial remunerations barely cover a short fling at the local bistro.

The choice in work camps is immense. The American Friends Service Committee at 20 South 12 St. in Philadelphia wants 80 volunteers to work in some 12 countries, including Jamaica and Haiti. The work, from June 15 to September 15, comprises mainly of clearing away rubble and land, and rebuilding homes. The Friends Committee is also looking for 150 to 175 students to work in Mexico.

U.S.N.S.A.

Another reliable organization which sponsors work camps is the Finnish National Union of Students. These camps are only of two weeks duration . . of lifting, cutting, and loading peat in Southern Finland. The camps are doubly attractive since Finland is not only noted for its warmly pro-American feelings, which manifest themselves in a variety of pleasant diversions, but also because the Olympic Games are but a short distance away. Literature is free from the USNSA Travel Dept., 48 West 48 St., New York.

Norway, another pleasant country, also offers farm, forestry, and roadbuilding camps of two of three weeks duration. National Union of Norwegian Students literature is available at the USNSA address. All functions sponsored by the northern lands are excellent. Swiss camps, on the other hand, get a thumbs-down from students who have worked there.

Religious organizations sponsor many good work camps, although of a more limited appeal. These include World Council of Churches, which has work camps in Japan and Assam (at an estimated cost of $1500) in addition to European camps, and the Congregational Christian Service Committee, and the Presbyterian Work Camps, both working through the World Council. The longest work camp, which lasts three months, is sponsored by the Jewish Agency for Palestine. Salaries in this case cover housing and living expenses.

Universities and Seminars

The only hitch to studying in Europe, except in the English-speaking American Academy and the American School of Classical Studies in Rome, is that one must be familiar enough with the language to understand the lectures.

In France, the University of Poitiers, in La Rochelle, and the Institute de Touraine in Tours are ecellent in their presentation of the language, literature, and civilization of France. Other Universities are good, with the exception of those in Paris and Strasbourg, which are bogged down with coke, hamburgers, and white shoes.

German, Italian, and Swiss universities are all good with the exception of Zurich and possibly Geneva, which suffer the fate of their French counterparts. Seminars of all sorts, too numerous to mention, function during the summer. Information regarding these, as well as the other phases of travel and study abroad, are available at P.B.H., in the office of the Student Council, or through the N.S.A. at their New Work address. For how not to travel, chapter I of Ludwig Bemelman's "I Love You, I Love You, I Love You," is required reading