Change is good. Sometimes.
This is how I often feel when I move to different countries. My first experience leaving home in Thailand was going to boarding school in England when I was 8 years old. It was a 180-degree change to a new and completely different environment: the people, food and even the air were different.
I don't remember much from the experience except the feeling that I was in a different world. My second time going abroad, however, was to Texas at the age of 16. I had no idea that people living on separate sides of the globe could have such different beliefs. I couldn't understand people there at first ' it was both the accent and the ideas.
I lived with an American family, and my biggest problem was telling them about my discomfort with things. Back home, telling someone you didn't like something they were doing hardly ever solves a problem.
A major incident for me was being taken to church because my host family thought I was Baptist. When I finally said something after four months, they allowed me to stop going to church.
I think that when someone sinks himself or herself into a completely different culture, he or she can thoroughly understand it. That understanding leads a person to appreciate what he or she has, see what he or she may not have, and look at life differently.
In my case, I learned ' after changing families twice ' that if I wanted to have a good relationship with my host families, I needed to express my discomfort when it was present. And I learned to appreciate being able to tell someone I was unhappy with something they did.
One of my good friends who went to Ghana for two weeks said one of the most valuable experiences she had was seeing people who had nothing offer her so much. It made her appreciate what she had and want to give more to others.
It's sort of like using a Mac versus using a PC. Mac and PCs are both computers, and they both have functions that can suit your needs. But the question is which one you like more. You can't really decide without trying both.
The problem is that the opportunity to travel is not always possible. According to statistics from the Office of Education Abroad Web site, 1,063 people studied abroad during the 2004-05 academic year. This is a significant increase from the 317 people who studied abroad in the 1995-96 academic year.
But even with the rising number of study abroad students and factors like cheaper plane tickets, some people have never been to another country. More importantly, a person might not get to fully experience a different culture even when he or she is in a different place.
I had always thought diversity was mostly good because it made people more tolerant of difference. But I thank the diversity at OU for also allowing me to experience a new culture without having to go somewhere else. Through the presence of 1,050 international students and an average of two cultural events each quarter, I have been able to continue learning about different cultures without traveling anywhere else.
Though people might act different when they are in another culture, their beliefs are always with them and can be seen through their actions. And though I might be catching only glimpses of other cultures, I feel that I'm getting to see the real thing. I think learning about another culture starts from bits of such experiences, and that's when I can begin finding out whether Macs or PCs suit me better.
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Rainy Phrompechrut
