3/3/08

i am confused. there are so many questions that are going through my head, and very rarely do they get affirmation. i can't find support, or at least some acknowledgment that what i am going through now is right, acceptable, good, and will lead to something better in the future. sometimes i talk to michael who also works at the ovp and she reminds me that it's ok, and that i shouldn't "shit all over myself." i reluctantly agree. i think what i need to do to help sort this out a bit more, as well as provide a reference for myself that progress isn't an illusion is: to write. write about what i'm struggling with, write about why i choose to do this, what i think i'm embarking on, what motivates me, and whatever other questions come up. // what is suffering? who are we to define it? // the question isn't whether or not we should go, but /how/ we should go. // link of the day from michael: http://chronicle.com/weekly/v54/i26/26a03401.htm title: american students abroad can't be 'global citizens' by talya zemach-bersin. i haven't read it yet but want to before work is over. i have to finish a homework assignment first.

with so much happening in my life here at school ...classes, clubs, boyfriend, friends and social ties, family, etc...how can i possibly focus on a larger picture? am i ethically supposed to? what about that question...should we care about people we don't know?

i don't intend to go somewhere and do something with a clear conscious, determination achieved by sorting out all of the questions i'm facing right now. i don't intend to feel that i know what i'm doing is right, but, rather, moving away from doing something i feel is wrong, in search for something different. // what exactly is wrong with this? i suppose what's wrong with this is that if i keep living here like this, (even knowingly?) i'll be living into the life of privilege, unquestioningly in practice, perhaps different in theory, but all the while at risk of falling into it after losing momentum to question, constantly swimming against the stream. this, i think, is what i'm trying to avoid right now: complacency created by buying into the system. i think this definitely stems from my parents saying they empathize with many of the counter-cultural feelings i experience now, but looking at them from my perspective, are part of that system (culture) themselves.

yeah, i guess granted that we can never really escape this privilege given to us at birth, and not that i'm trying to necessarily avoid the facts, but i'd rather not continue the treadmill.

what can i do to end this culture of privilege, of imperialism? this is what i seek to answer.

this, though, should not be the motivation to go abroad, to seek to find it outside of ourselves. or should it? can we not get a good glimpse of our own culture without contrasting it to another? taking ourselves and placing our cultured selves into another culture, and examining the differences? i think the answer is: both are needed. we need to be fully grounded here at the same time as exploring our boundaries with contrast to other cultures, and noting the details of the differences. perhaps in this way we can inform ourselves about our culture, about its deficiencies and about parts that should be embraced and celebrated.