August 2014 – Page 3 – GW Blogs from Abroad

Around the World in 100 Days!

AdminAugust 12, 2014December 17, 2018

Greetings, readers!

First off, thank you for your interest and support. I am transitioning back to writing in English, since I have spent the past two months in Spain immersing myself in the language and culture. As we say in Spanish, I am “sin palabras” –an inexplicable and intertwined sentiment of awe, excitement, and anxiety. Summer vacation is quickly transforming into a countdown for the start of my global travelogue. Soon, I will be heading home to unpack and then repack for the journey ahead.

As a novice blogger, my goal is to engage you digitally as I traverse continents and oceans in search of one question: what are human rights? Each day we are challenged to uphold, preserve, and defend these rights. The news, social media networks, and our personal experiences shape how we perceive our human rights. More often than not, we witness that these intrinsic and universal rights are at odds with geopolitics, economics, and culture. As a budding social activist, I believe that the most direct way to understand these phenomena is by contemplating about them respective national contexts.

Because of this, I have chosen this particular SIT Study Abroad program. Here are the sites that we’ll visit over the next 15 weeks with a brief list of topics:

New York City, USA

Organizing grassroots movements
Documenting human rights issues

Santiago, Chile

Understanding post-conflict social transformations
Recognizing indigenous rights

Amman, Jordan

Identifying historical roots of refugee conflicts
Rethinking approaches to humanitarian intervention

Kathmandu, Nepal

Interrogating new models of trade and democracy
Contextualizing the role of multi-ethnicism

I will spend the next few weeks reading, researching, and relaxing before the journey begins. Traveling and conducting field research have always been lifelong goals, and now they are coming to fruition. More than anything else, I am ready to learn firsthand about the challenges that affect our common humanity. How will our awareness change into measurable social action?

I look forward to sharing more details with you in the weeks ahead (with more pictures too!). Please feel free to share your opinions, thoughts, and questions! And, if you get a chance, like my Facebook page “Karim Dreams for Peace,” as I will be posting weekly articles, images, and quotes about human rights. Let the travels begin!

It’s All in the Minutiae

AdminAugust 12, 2014December 14, 2018

By Jess Yacovelle

So I have a little over four weeks until my departure from San Diego and about five hundred little things left to do.

The emphasis should be on "little." While it's true that I may have employed a slight hyperbole in the actual number of activities I need to complete, the fact is I have a tedium of chore after chore to accomplish before I depart for London, and no one warned me about all of the minutiae involved.

Oh, sure. As a student, I was warned well in advance to gather the documents needed to secure a visa. I was told to apply for housing at King's College - my host university - and to sign up for classes. I was even told to find a sturdy umbrella because it rains a lot in London.

My mentors conveniently left out, however, the paperwork you need to fill out if you wish to pick up a four month's supply of your medication in advance. I wasn't told about the struggle to find a UK cell phone or SIM card in the United States that you won't have to pay for until you land in the UK. And don't even get me started on the myriad of wall adapters I have to order online so I can actually charge my cell phone whilst I'm in the UK (yeah, that's a thing).

I suppose I'm starting this journey at a slight disadvantage; I've never been out of the country on my own before. It's a common enough reality, until you realize I mentioned earlier that I'm from San Diego. I'm literally an hour and a half away from Mexico, and I've never been. When I was a child, I was too young to warrant such a trip. By the time I grew old enough to truly appreciate the experience, Tijuana had become far too dangerous for naive white Americans to arbitrary venture across the border.

We went to Canada twice when I was child, but I never had to deal with the trivialities of travel; I was young enough that my father took care of it all, and I simply had to show up.

Perhaps I just have poor timing; my driver's license, credit card, and passport were all set to expire whilst I'll be away, and I had to spend days renewing these documents. All I know is there are a litany of little, seemingly innocuous things to deal with before going abroad. If there's one thing I can't stress enough to anyone considering to travel, it's don't skimp on the details. Pay attention to everything, and make sure all of your affairs (insurance, bank statements, cell phone, appropriate clothing, etc) are in order before you depart. Don't wait until the last minute; some things take three or four weeks to be processed, like medication forms.

I still have a few more things to cross off of my list before I go. Wish me luck.

A New Semester

AdminAugust 12, 2014

quad — The Quad at the University of Stellenbosch

It’s hard to explain how it feels to have just finished the first week of my second semester here at Stellenbosch University. After a long semester break, of which I stayed in town to save money and explore, I was happy to see the town slowly fill back up again with excited students greeting each other and catching up. For us here in South Africa, our academic year runs from January-December, with this semester being the second of the two.

South Africa has the top three universities on the continent- University of Cape Town, University of Pretoria, and the University of Stellenbosch (where I attend) as well as seven of the top 11 universities in Africa. The closest top tier universities are in places like Nigeria and Egypt. As such, students from Southern Africa flock here for their studies, making for a diverse population of students from places like Namibia, Botswana, and Lesotho, as well as South Africa. This being said, both the University of Stellenbosch and University of Cape Town are predominantly white- with 68.5% of Stellenbosch and 38.6% at UCT. Many of the universities have historical racial relationships, as universities such as the University of Witwatersrand, or Wits as they call it, was created for black students to study at, University of Western Cape was for only coloured students (mixed-race), while universities like Stellenbosch only admitted white students.

Seeing as policies regarding which racial groups could apply to which colleges only changed in the last several decades, the university’s demographics remain largely the same nowadays. However, more and more non-white students are attending college here every year.

Students doing the same major at university take a set sequence of classes each semester and each year. This makes it a little difficult for someone coming from the looser American system, in which I can take a second year course, fourth year course, general education requirement, and an elective all within one semester. Additionally, different degrees take different amounts of years, so college is not considered a 4-year process, but rather dependent upon degree (no surprise here- science degrees take longer than humanity degrees). Seeing as the South African university system was set up by their lovely colonizer, England, schools concentrate on lateral learning as opposed to rote memorization- something I appreciate coming from a system which many times focuses on regurgitation rather than engrained knowledge.

Unfortunately, South Africa- like many developing countries, has a problem with “brain drain”. With only 12 of every 100 high schoolers in ZA qualifying for university, and university drop-outs outnumbering graduates, there is a lack of highly skilled labor in South Africa. Even still, those who are educated rarely remain in the country, opting instead to work in places like the UK or various places in the developed world. In an interesting read by Business Future’s in 2010, it is stated “The African human resource pool is continuously depleted as the educated choose to emigrate and apply their skills abroad. It is estimated that since 1990, some 20,000 skilled professionals have been leaving Africa on an annual basis, depriving the continent of the doctors, nurses, teachers, and engineers it needs to break the cycle of poverty and under-development” (Roux 2010). It sort of connects ZA having such good universities and yet poor leadership, eh?

The bibliotek at the University of Stellenbosch

This being said, universities are universities, and college kids are the same everywhere. Between hazing first-year students, to professors who seem to have it out for you, to the library having an exponential population spike just before exams- it’s really not so different than back home. For me, it’s mind-blowing that one semester here has already come and gone, but I am so happy with how it turned out. My first semester was full of exploring cities, making friends, and attending events ranging from competing in a cooking competition to a masquerade ball at the student theatre. Based on this week, I am confident that my second semester will be no different!

Third Time’s the Charm

AdminAugust 11, 2014December 14, 2018

By bevvy2212

You know how there are places that you don’t expect yourself to re-visit in the near future? Well, Paris is the exception. I first visited Paris when I was 15, too young to really appreciate its beauty, now looking back. I was like any eager tourist, snapping selfies with the Eiffel tower. (Were selfies even a thing back then?) My second visit to Paris was during my junior year of high school. I did not expect my return to Paris to be so soon but I wasn’t complaining. It gave me a really odd feeling of “coming home”, like when I was visiting Versailles with my friends, I knew the rooms and the stories to them. But still, it didn’t feel like I got the gist of Paris.

Part of the reason why I love traveling so much is because cities are like people too. I have to spend quality time wandering around their meandering streets in order to form deeper bonds with them. The touristy places, feel almost insincere at times. Here is a brief digression. I have just returned from a six-week-volunteering program from Peru. One of the main reasons why I wanted to go in the first place was because of Machu Picchu. I mean, who cares about educating the future generation of a country that has a 35% poverty rate? (Jokes, for those who couldn’t tell.) I was stationed in Trujillo, the third largest city in Peru, totally Peruvian. It was nothing like Lima or Machu Picchu where foreigners swarmed the streets and almost gave me the illusion that I was still in America, except the bathrooms were without toilet paper (A phenomenon that’s pretty much everywhere except in the US). In Trujillo, I taught English to kids from kindergarten up to sixth grade and they had touched my heart in a way that I never expected it to be touched. It was a very sad day for me to leave, and Peru forever holds a special place in my heart.

That’s the kind of relationship I want to form with a country, let people into my life and leave my tracks behind as well. I don’t expect my 6-week-English-lessons to change my kids’ lives, but to know that I have made impact on their lives is one of the greatest feelings I have ever experienced. So I hope that by spending a semester in Paris, I’d be able to get to know it personally. Who knows, the future is bright, maybe third time’s the charm!

Side note: for future references, those who wish to apply for a French visa should try to get it done in the United States. I did mine in China and it was the most painful experience ever. I couldn’t even get on the CampusFrance website without a proper proxy. (Thanks communism.)

First Week at Stellenbosch

AdminAugust 11, 2014December 14, 2018

By rbhargava

Hello friends and welcome to the first edition of many blog posts to come on my adventures and experiences at Stellenbosch University. Although I'm no expert on the region, I want to start off this post with a little background on the region and the university. Stellenbosch is in the heart of South Africa's Cape Winelands, and is 30 miles away from Cape Town. Today, its wine may make it famous, but the university keeps this city alive. With about 30,000 students, the university is ranked second in South Africa after the University of Cape Town, and is a major academic center in the country. As such, the city attracts some of the smartest minds in the country and is an important part of the Western Cape's economy. What I really want to highlight is the university's history. As the top Afrikaan university, Stellenbosch is unfortunately also known as the birthplace of apartheid. With that said, the university and city today ironically face many of the repercussions of the policies it helped create. The city is one of the most unequal places on Earth, with deeply segregated communities ranging from the wealthy whites on one side of town, coloreds on the other, and blacks in a far off corner. A foreigner would never see these differences, as Stellenbosch does well to hide these systemic problems behind the facades of beautiful Cape Dutch architecture and the majestic mountains that make Stellenbosch the beautiful valley town that it is. It is important to keep all of this in mind, as 20 years after apartheid - Stellenbosch is both the perfect example of the rainbow nation, and the perfect example of everything that has held South Africa back.

With the scene set and on a lighter note, let me talk more about my first week here in South Africa! As part of the CIEE study abroad program I am on (called Sustainability and Community), I spent my first week at the Sustainability Institute in a small town outside Stellenbosch called Lynedoch. Set in the midst of some of the country's best wineries, I had the chance to get my first exposure of South Africa from a sustainable development perspective - learning about issues of food security from a local farmer, hearing about one winery's efforts to become greener from a former VP, and talking to researchers about efforts being taken to improve the living standards and environment of the informal settlement in Stellenbosch called Enkanini. Hearing from these individuals and many more gave me a great overview of what Stellenbosch is all about.

Skipping ahead, after a fantastic praxis week at the Sustainability Institute, I went on a tour of the peninsula with my program (there's only two of us on the program) on Saturday. Having only been at and near Stellenbosch since arriving, I had yet to see the Cape Town. Driving there, we passed an endless line of informal settlements that was a strong reminder of the stark divisions that have come to define the country today. Cape Town of course was as beautiful as any city I've seen, and we had the chance to drive up Signal Hill, a beautiful vantage point from which most of Cape Town can be seen. Driving down the peninsula, we were able to stop at Boulders Beach in Simonstown, where hundreds of penguins were waddling around on the beach...a sight like no other! We also stopped at the Cape of Good Hope and Cape Point at the very end of the peninsula - the southwestern most part of Africa. Reflecting back on this day trip around the peninsula, the Cape Town area is full of absolutely beautiful places and is blessed with some of the most diverse wildlife on the planet, but the abundant inequalities among whites, coloreds, and blacks make it difficult to call Cape Town a great city.