WATERLOO - Jerry Spurgat taught English in Afghanistan 38 years ago as a Peace Corps volunteer. He left figuring he got more out of it than his students.

He found out last year he was wrong. A former student, now a doctor in Frankfurt, Germany, looked him up. Dr. Amamullah Alsee wanted to reconnect with the man he credits with not only teaching him English, which he says enabled him to learn German and become successful, but also with building the foundation for English education in the Afghan city of Herat.

Alsee and his 13-year-old son, Omar, traveled to the United States and spent last week with the Spurgats.

"He was the first American teacher in the city," Alsee said. "Also, the schools didn't have a real English lesson. He put the filament in it" so they did.

"I am very happy the moment I find these people."

Spurgat, 63, retired from his interior design job two months ago. His wife, Lynne, is a retired nurse. They have lived in Waterloo nearly 30 years.

Spurgat went to Afghanistan in 1965 at a time many Americans had never heard of the country.

"They called and said, 'Would you like to be part of the Peace Corps?'" Spurgat said. "I said yes. They said, 'How would you like to go to Afghanistan?' I said yes and hung up, then I went to a map to find out where it was."

He spent six years in Afghanistan - the first three as a volunteer teaching English to students and training others to teach it, the next three as a paid Peace Corps staff member in Kabul.

"We always as volunteers thought that when we came home, we brought more home with us than we left behind," Spurgat said.

After all, Spurgat got a lot out of his time in Afghanistan. He met his wife there - she was a Peace Corps volunteer nurse. They had their child there, and gave her an Afghan name - Makai.

"But now it's becoming evident that we did do something," he said. He said English was "kind of a ticket beyond the borders of Afghanistan."

Alsee first thought about calling Spurgat when he arrived in Germany in 1978. But it was a daunting task, finding a teacher from another country after all those years. "You can't just start it today and find him the next day," Alsee said.

He thought about asking the Red Cross for help finding Spurgat. Then, years later, while talking to a former classmate living in Florida - many of Spurgat's former students kept in touch with each other - Alsee asked him to look up Spurgat on the Internet.

It worked.

Alsee tried calling Spurgat a couple of times but got his answering machine. He didn't leave a message. "I thought it's better to try talking to him personally," Alsee said.

Finally, Spurgat was there to answer the call.

"It was somewhat startling," Spurgat recalled. "In fact, I had difficulty remembering - I had taught a lot of students - so I had difficulty remembering exactly who he was."

They talked about once a month over the next year. "He really wanted to renew the acquaintance."

Spurgat learned Amamullah isn't the only former student to achieve success or live abroad. Many of his former students have. One former student is now the foreign minister for Afghanistan.

"It's a very rewarding feeling. … There's many other students who remember me and that point in their life," Spurgat said. "The reward is that we were remembered. The reward is that we did give them an opportunity to go beyond their lives in Afghanistan."

Contact Jeff Wilford at (319) 291-1423 or jeff.wilford@wcfcourier.com.