5/22: Leaving Sapa
We left our hotel at 6:45 am and walked about 15 minutes to the spot where the large buses were parked, to begin our 8 hour bus ride to Ha Long Bay. On the way I ran into my H'mong friend, Song. I have known Song for 12 years, since our first Global Studies trip to Sapa in 2006. She was only 16 years old then. she is now 28 and has three children. Song and I seem to always find each other at some point in my stay in Sapa. Here are photos of her over the years.
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| Song in 2009 |
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| Song in 2011 |
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| Song in 2013 |
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| Song in 2018 |
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| One of our boats |
We arrived on our boat in late afternoon, and had our first evening meeting on the roof deck of one of the boats.
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| First evening meeting |
5/22 First evening meeting on the boat: My essential lesson
A lesson from the Dalia Lama:
At our first evening meeting on the boat in Halong Bay, I shared the following story and lesson: “The Dalai Lama is the ‘God-King’ to the Tibetan people. He is believed to be the reincarnation of Chenrezi, the Buddha of Compassion. In 1950, when he was 15 years old, the Chinese communists invaded Tibet (The Chinese perspective is that they “liberated” the Tibetan people). The Dalia Lama tried to work with the Chinese government for 9 years, but when rumors grew of an assassination plot of the Dalai Lama by the Chinese, the Dalai Lama was snuck out of Tibet into India in 1959. He set up the Tibetan government in exile in Daramsala, India and has lived there ever since, along with hundreds of thousands of Tibetans. Over the course of the next 50 years, millions of Tibetans have died, either at the hands of the Chinese, or through their mismanagement of resources. When asked in an interview about his feelings towards the Chinese, he replied that this has been one of his most difficult and greatest lessons. It is easy to feel compassion for those who are close to you, but to practice compassion for the Chinese government, after all that has happened to his people, has been a great challenge.
Being empowered to choose our own story:
It is all a matter of perspective. If the Dalia Lama can choose to grow from the great adversity that he and his people have suffered, then so can we. Of course, bad things happen. Of course sometimes people or mean or cruel or insensitive. Things happen which are out of our control. The power we do have is how we will engage with it. The perspective we choose is our own. We choose the stories we tell ourselves. We are each responsible for our own reality. No one makes you do anything. No one makes you mad, or angry, or sad. It is important to “own” the way in which we respond. We can react. We can become victims of our circumstances. Or we can choose another perspective. If you feel slighted – investigate it. If you feel upset – investigate it. Why do you choose this perspective?
Everyone is responsible for the reality they choose. And we are not responsible for the reality others choose. You do not need to be so engaged in what others are doing. That is their responsibility. As Byron Katie wrote, “If you are spending all of your time living someone else’s life, then who is living your life? You can choose to be “hooked” by your thoughts and feelings, or you can choose a different perspective. You can observe them, identify them, and then let them go. You can choose to be empowered by it and grow from it. You get to choose the story you tell yourself. You have an opportunity to choose who you want to be.
“My Essential lesson”
Then Eli continued with a reflective writing exercise, using the following prompts:
· What new perspective do you have about yourself?
· What new perspective do you have about how you engage?
· What lesson would you like to take home with you?
This exercise and lesson have set the stage for students to write “my essential lesson,” to be shared in 3 days at the farewell dinner.
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| sun set photos |
5/23 Tai Chi, Kayaking, and swimming
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| sun rise photo |
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| 6:15 am Tai Chi lesson on the roof deck |
Kayaking
Evening meeting lesson: Who do you want to take home and who do you want to leave?
The objective of this meeting was to create a safe environment where students were comfortable being self-reflective and vulnerable. All three trip leaders shared a story demonstrating their own vulnerability.
Lesson on letting go:
We all have voices in our head from experiences in our past, self- critical messages we have learned from our parents, from other authority figures, from our peers, and from ourselves. Many of these stories we have outgrown, but they still exist inside of us. It is as if we are running a projector of the movie of our life. Our reflection of the world is a projection of our own state of mind. And even though these are just stories, it can be so difficult to change the stories. It is as if the more we try to stifle these stories, the more power we give them.
So a lesson I learned (and continue to learn over and over again) is that we need to learn to accept these stories, to love all aspects of who we are, not deny sides of our self. When we accept who we are, then we do not need to let go of the stories, for they let go of us. As Byron Katie wrote, “It is not our thoughts, but the attachment to our thoughts, that causes suffering. . . . I do not let go of my thoughts – I meet them with understanding, and they let go of me.”
The students were asked the following prompts to reflect on: What thoughts, actions, or behaviors are no longer serving you? What stories are you willing to leave behind? Here are some quotes from the students’ sharing:
“I need to learn to accept help.”
“I need to let go of closing myself off when I am down.”
“I want to leave behind being such a ‘no-it-all’ and showing off my knowledge.”
“I want to leave behind the story that says if that no one will love me if they knew everything about me.”
“I need to stop being over-logical and over-analytical.”
“I need to stop doing stupid things to make myself look cooler.”
“I need to let go of being afraid of being wrong. I need to let go of my fear of failure.”
“I want to let go needing to know what will happen next, which conflicts with being present in this moment.”
“When I am in difficult situations, I try to avoid the issue. I need to do something instead of avoiding difficult situations.”
“I need to stop stressing about things that are not in my control.”
“I need to stop closing off my emotional side, and be more aware of how I act.”
“I need to be better about accepting other’s experiences.”
“I want to leave behind the stuff that happened years ago, bringing it into every moment, which poisons everything.”
“I want to leave behind invalidating my own emotions.”
“I want to leave behind doing things just because my friends do them.”
“I want to leave behind my tendency to overthink thing and make everything about me.”
“I want to leave behind not voicing my own opinion if I think my friends won’t agree with it.”
And then one last piece of advice given to the students before we moved on to the logistics of the next day: Sometimes we have to learn lessons again and again, so be gentle with yourself.
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| sun set |
5/24 Our last full day in Vietnam
This is our last full day in Vietnam. Our itinerary was: Tai Chi in the roof deck in the early morning, cruise to Cat Ba Island for a bike ride to the village and then a hike to the top of a mountain to see the spectacular view of Ha Long Bay, lunch, boating to the monkey island, afternoon swim, evening meeting, dinner, birthday celebrations (Elijah and Phoebe) and finally, dance party on the roof deck.
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| morning photo with one of our boats |
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| fish farming |
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| View of Ha Long Bay from the top of the hike |
Evening meeting: Reincorporation
The theme of the evening meeting was reincorporation. Our experience has been that the greatest “culture shock” is not when the students enter a new culture, for they have been preparing all year and are expecting something very different than what they are used to, but the return to their own culture. And most significantly, the impact of the return to the family culture.
Our hope always is that the Global Studies experience abroad is transformative. Students are exposed to such differences in the way other people live that it inspires self-reflection. We provide the students with opportunities to stretch themselves and challenge their assumptions. By taking students out of their familiar culture, students begin to grow their appreciation for much that is taken for granted and re-evaluation of who they are and who they want to be. Sometimes the perspective shift is great, and sometimes it is very subtle. Sometimes it happens immediately and sometimes it takes months or years to digest and absorb the new knowledge and perspective.
At the evening meeting, students were presented with the notion of dissonance, how things might feel just a little bit off. Students were asked to reflect again on who they were leaving behind and who they were taking with them. They were asked to think about what new responsibilities they were willing to take on to show their rowing maturity.
Being a parent to teenagers is very challenging as students shift their support network towards their peers and look for ways to separate and grow their freedoms, while parents try to hold on and protect. Hopefully, the Global Studies program helps in this process by encouraging students engage in these negotiations in a mature and responsible manner. And though these shifts can be tumultuous, our last piece of advice to the students was to be patient and understanding with the process of reincorporation.
Dance party
Dear 8thgrade parents,
I want to thank you for raising such wonderful children. This is my 31th year in the Global Studies program, and my 19th trip. I am grateful for the opportunity to experience the students’ support of each other, their engagement in this foreign culture, and their willingness to go deep: to reveal themselves and to share their insights. It has been a blessing to both bear witness to this process and to learn from these bright, insightful, sensitive young men and women. I am so thankful to have been given the opportunity to know your students better and in a different way from in the classroom.
Love,
Robert
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| morning photo |
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