An Adventure is When You Don’t Know What’s Going to Happen!
NEW BEGINNINGS:
The second that I stepped off the plane and into Latin America, I felt immediately displaced and slightly overwhelmed with the bonds that the people of Peru have around me. The language is strong and spoken with a thick accent that makes you lose confidence in yourself and your Spanish speaking abilities. The language is beautiful, yet difficult for me to remember. For 15 years, I took Spanish lessons in school and today I can barely form a sentence. I was forced into something I did not like at the time. I was forced to study something that brought no interest to my 12-year-old self. At this age, I was a rebel and didn’t want to break my barriers and learn something new. As I stepped into the Lima airport, I wish someone would have slapped me as a kid and told me that everything I would learn would be valuable one day. I wish someone would have sat me down and practiced Spanish in a fun and enticing way. I wish I would have enjoyed learning and educating myself on a new language that spoke so beautifully. Instead, I only thought of the negative sides to this new language when I was a kid and today I write with regret that I was not mature enough to pay attention. Although new languages made me uncomfortable, I knew that I needed to sit back down in college and search through my discomfort and bad memories of Spanish lessons to find the good and use that good to help me learn and expand my knowledge for the upcoming month in Peru. As I step back and analyze my feelings of this whirl wind of a week, I contemplate whether new immigrants feel this way when they step into the United States for the first time? How do they find help in a generous way? Who is helping them find new jobs and new opportunities in what is supposed to be the land of free opportunities? I can imagine they are just as scared as I was when I first arrived in this new country. I just hope I can expand my previous understanding of education by complicating my ideas to make me a better educator.
WITH TIME COMES ANSWERS:
As an educational studies student in Peru, I believe it is important to understand the reasons why I decided to come to Peru in the first place. I wanted to learn how the education system functions for all ages. I wanted to expand and compare the studies that are provided for all students from different class levels. To understand my reasoning’s, I’ve developed a long list of questions in my head. These questions help me make sense of what I am witnessing. Why is it more difficult for students from the Highlands/Jungle region to even receive basic education? Why is it that brilliant people cannot attend college because they come from a background with no money? Why does the government still create large fees on homes of those who live on cliffs? Why is it so difficult for people to understand basic human rights? And so many more questions that are constantly swimming around in my head begging to be answered. I do not think I will be able to answer all these questions before my month of studies is up, but with time I am hoping to understand and develop deeper meanings for the culture, people, and communities that are connected to this beautiful country of Peru. One asset that I will take advantage of is the assistance of my Jesuit education and the values that I have gained throughout the years to keep my reality and privilege in line when observing and immersing myself in new cultures. I am hoping and searching for the systematical methods to contribute to my social, moral, and intellectual foundations of myself.
Inequality in my everyday life:
I had a basic understanding of the injustices that happened and continue to happen in Peru. One historic site that we had the opportunity of driving by was the “Wall of Shame”. I had no idea this level of injustice was a major landmark to this city. This wall is an imposing barrier towards gated communities. This wall controls and excludes certain communities from coming close to one another. “The Wall of Shame was built to exclude poor and disadvantaged citizens from more affluent areas of the city. It is built along class lines, rather than ethnic borders.”
This idea of gated communities is related to the United States and is even more prominent within the Milwaukee area. The distinction between rich and poor are obvious. In Peru, the rich assembled cameras and security to make them feel safe. They are surrounded by pools, gardens, and shopping. Meanwhile, the other side of the wall creates this image that those who live in Pamplona Alta are known as thieves. These residents live in tiny homes made from scraps they found in garbage such as sand, tin, dirt, and leftover wood. These characteristics make up this community on the other side of the wall. In Milwaukee, there is this system called relining and it continues to form the racial segregation in this area. “Milwaukee is one of the most racially segregated cities in the United States, and one of segregation’s most meaningful engines was the historical practice of redlining.” These discriminatory practices are like the Wall of Shame intentions in Peru. Redlining was used to shape the social landscape. Although laws have been passed and history has changed, discrimination in housing remain prominent to the public eye. The differences between the two communities, no matter the country, are astonishing. In the New York Times article, it states, “I’ve come to believe that the first step toward making the world a better place is to simply experience that place.”
The Concept of Power:
Power is all around us in our everyday lives. Power is present within every relationship that we create. Power is neglected in educational studies. The talk of power brings excitement and attention. Power is embedded into our fundamental category as humans. “I say that power requires a plan, and that a plan implies an intent, I do not wish to be taken as saying that only intended effects are to be considered when analyzing the nature of power.” Power is difficult to understand, and the people of Peru created trust and loyalty with their Presidents. Their Presidents took their power and did not fulfill the requirements of the job. They worked in the opposite direction of satisfying the people and ended up digging themselves in bigger holes. The power of the people was placed in their hands and they botched the whole order. Power requires plan and execution to make stronger communities, but the other step is consent to your plan and “every governing order is dependent on the consent of the governed.”
Power in the systems that surround us every day require consent, but when stepping back to view more in depth situations, people are realizing that there was no consent of power at all. Power is used to support and make the wealthy people happy. This brings the lower classes down and brings a stronger argument that inequality will just expand. Power can be used for good, but considering the last few Presidents of Peru have gotten in trouble with treason and cases of corruption, the trust and loyalty in government officials continues to fly out the window. When will, wealthy realize the inequality they express in their actions and choice of words? When will other countries realize that there is a lot of work to be done and someone needs to act? Many questions, but like I said, through time and patience I am hoping to deepen my understanding of my time here and the situations that surround me every day.
