It was an incredibly full week. I ended up teaching yoga 5 days, which was really a gift. Jacob, the other teacher, had a meeting one day, and was sick the next and ended up in the hospital with a fever. Thankfully, he is recovering. Meanwhile, I taught two vigorous classes, which got me out of my teaching shell, as I usually teach gentle to moderate. I had a lot of fun teaching the vigorous classes and would like to do more of it.
It is so wonderful to be teaching people who I spend a lot of time with, who come to class over and over, who I share lunch and classes with. It is such a unique situation, and one that I might not find myself again in life after UPEACE, so I am really treasuring it right now. It also really helps me to "walk the talk." I am with my students all day, so I have even more incentives and reminders to practice what I teach. It is really helping me to grow as a teacher, and I am finding that the more I teach, the more it nourishes me.
Meanwhile, classes are good. This week we talked more about positive peace (as opposed to negative peace, which is the absence of war), with issues such as sustainability, gender, and (drum roll)....peace education! Friday was a lecture by Professor Cawagas, who will be teaching my first peace ed course. Her lecture made me very excited to start the program.
Lots and lots of extracirricular activities this week, too. We had a meeting about campus tour guides, which I had helped organized, and had career workshops all week. Boy, are they helpful! There is this amazing woman, Christine, who is the career advisor here. How wonderful to have workshops now, to start thinking about jobs and opportunities for post-grad life at the beginning of the year, rather than waiting until the end when everyone is scrambling to find something before graduation. They've been fun, and are helping us to develop skills that will really serve us in the long run.
What else...the weekend was quiet. I have mostly been reading and starting the last two assignments for the foundation course. One is a group presentation on social learning theory. The other is a paper on "the key challenges to peace in your national/regional/social/cultural context," in 2,000 words or less.
Two thousand words! Not many, when I think I could write a list of two thousand challenges to peace in America. I had an idea to talk about the issues of peace and security near military bases. While visiting my parents in Oceanside, it seemed evident to me that the community experienced high levels of violent crime and gang activity, which I imagine is related to the military culture. Unfortunately, I haven't found many studies to confirm this, so I may have to change topics. One thing that is very well documented, however, is domestic violence in military families, so I might focus on that. I'm also really interested in the psychological and cultural factors that lead to violence and war, particularly relating to our "culture of fear." So many interesting topics, but only 2,000 words, and I need to get focused and start writing!
(Any feedback or ideas are greatly appreciated!)
Well, on that note, I'd better get back to work. I'm still finding my way as a student again, as I haven't researched in a long time, and technology has changed a lot since I last wrote a research paper back in 2000. I have a feeling this will get easier as the year goes on. Right now, it's a little daunting and overwhelming - but giving the old noggin good exercise!
Oh! And I forgot to mention La Carpio. I went on a little field trip on Saturday to a slum area in San Jose called La Carpio, where UPEACE volunteers have doing projects for a number of years. One of the programs they've been doing is an English class, so on Saturday afternoon a group of us went down to teach. Unfortunately, perhaps due to a torrential rain storm, no one showed up. However, we did get to see the community and figured out how to get there. We felt safe, and the community was vibrant, with people hanging out in the streets (when it wasn't raining), and lots of street vendors selling food. It would be nice to do some practical community development projects there.
OK, on that note, I'm really signing off. Thanks for reading! :-)
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