AFS San Diego

By Robert Sawhill, former ambulance driver

Claudio Theophilo (last name omitted) is not an American as his name indicates.
But he lives in Rancho Bernardo with the Rick and Tracey Lysander family and attends the high school there as a junior under the auspices of the AFS Intercultural Student Exchange Program. He uses Claudio Theophilo for short when signing his name at school.

Claudio, 17, whose brother was an AFS student in Salinas last year, is in America on a J-1 visa, issued by the State Department for foreign exchange students for one year. He arrived in San Diego last August from Brazil along with 16 other AFS exchange students from many different countries, such as Italy, Norway and Thailand. These students are enrolled now in various high schools throughout San Diego County, from Coronado to Fallbrook to Torrey Pines.

After 2.5 years serving dutifully as the San Diego Area Team Chair, Norbert has announced his retirement from the position. After a some deliberation from the board, Nick Felfe has been elected to succeed Norbert.

After World War II, 250 American Field Service drivers, including Bob Sawhill, pledged to sustain their tradition of service and created the AFS International Scholarships. Many of these ambulance drivers ferried wounded Allied as well as German soldiers from the battle field to field hospitals. Bob's experience was markedly different. Here is his story:

I was a sophomore at college in 1944 and 4-F in the draft because of a heart murmur. Yet, I wanted to find something to do for the war effort, so I applied in New York to the American Field Service, the volunteer ambulance service. Accepted, I joined 59 members of Unit 57; more than half were teen-agers like me.

We sailed out on the “Ile de France” on May 26, 1945. We changed ships in Scotland a week later, sailing out on the British hospital ship “H.M.S. Strathmore” through the Mediterranean, Suez Canal and Red Sea. We landed at Colombo, Ceylon, June 27th. We now know that we arrived there in error. We were to have landed in Calcutta, and did so on July 16th after sailing on the “Talma”, a P&O cruise ship.