A 10-year-old boy from northern Germany ran away to Switzerland after receiving a bad grade on his school report, according to German media.
Local newspaper Schleswiger Nachrichten reported that the unnamed boy ran away because he was too scared to tell his parents about a single “average” grade in one of his classes. German Federal police reported that the child’s worst grade was a “3,” which is equivalent to getting a C in the United States.
Whether the boy’s cross-country flight was motivated by high expectations of himself or some other factor is still not clear.
The evening of July 21, the child somehow acquired a valid train ticket and boarded a train headed to Hamburg, Germany. He then transferred to a train bound for Basel, Switzerland.
The boy’s home in Schleswig, Germany is about a 10-hour train ride away from Switzerland, or about 590 miles.
The young fellow was already at the border of Switzerland when a conductor alerted German Federal police about a young boy traveling alone. The boy cooperated and patiently stayed with police as they tried to locate his parents.
“Our officers have taken care of the boy, played with him, and given him food,” said a police officer according to Schleswiger news report.
The boy’s parents had already alerted police in their hometown that their child was missing.
Word soon got back to the parents that the boy had been located, and they were reunited the next day.
Not much is known about the family, except that they are immigrants from Afghanistan, and they wished to remain anonymous.
“We don’t know much more about him because he spoke little German,” said a police officer when asked by the German newspaper about the child’s identity.
