Blog Post 6 - GH

Dear future participant,

First, I want to clarify that my experience in Zambia was very complex and that the learning processes I started there are far from complete. The process of self-reflection and learning is life long and I would be cautious about the mentality that a summer abroad trip will “change” you or that you will “find yourself” in Zambia. That mentality often inadvertently leads you down a path of passive engagement. Zambia will not change you just because it is a foreign country and you will not find yourself just because you are traveling. Taken in an active light, Zambia is everything you make for yourself—the relationships that you form and maintain, the places and things you explore, and the way you interact with new situations.

You will see a few themes in the advice my cohort gives: actively engaging with your host family and strangers you meet, learning to find support within your cohort, exploring new activities outside your comfort zone and discovering that your existing passions can be reimagined in a different environment. Beyond this advice, I can share the experience that caused the most cognitive dissonance for me through the summer. I am a Taiwanese-American who struggles with the typical child-of-immigrants identity crisis of being an American with a hyphen that places me between an ethnic home I did not grow up in and a geographical home that often thinks I do not belong. In the US, I wander through the experiences that shape my cultural identity, hoping to find clarity in something, anything. In Zambia, those experiences, for better or for worse, were thrown in my face. People shouted “China” and “Chinese” at me whenever I walked by. I was greeted with “ni hao” from down the street instead of “muli bwanji.” The cognitive dissonance was overwhelming. It was not necessarily because I take pride in the distinction of being Taiwanese rather than Chinese. Rather, it was uncomfortable because in a new environment where I was trying my best to engage with the world thoughtfully and carefully, the world still seemed to coarsely see me as my perceived ethnicity and whatever identities they associated with it.

I learned very quickly that these interactions are different than the ones I often faced in the US. Perhaps the comments on the street were ignorant, but I noticed that the Zambians were not mocking me like people often are in the US. They were trying to find a way to connect with me, as if this was their way of saying “I see you.” In an environment where people take so much undying pride in being Zambian, I saw them believing that my ethnicity was important to me and they greeted me with a “ni hao” to show that they respected the perceived importance of my ethnicity to myself. While not every encounter was exactly like this, I learned throughout the summer to just greet people back with a smile and a “muli bwanji” and to continue walking. The discomfort of the experience did not wear off during the two months, but reflecting upon the cognitive dissonance that accompanied it helped me navigate encounters that I would have seen as intolerable in the US context and see that my ethnic identity means something unique in a different environment. For future participants who feel profiled, sometimes unfairly so, please take a step back, do not engage, and see how a different context can shape a better understanding of what is important to you and what is important to the person you interact with.

My second piece of advice is to explore your positionality and accept your vulnerabilities. Identify them and then reflect upon them through journaling or talking to your cohort, host families and coworkers. Cornell students are often so engrained in this mentality of projecting strength and cohesiveness that we forget to learn more about ourselves and others through admitting our vulnerabilities and insecurities. Engaging in this process should be started before going to Zambia and continued long after you return. Do not expect to come back from Zambia with all the answers. For me, I asked questions as simple as “what does it mean to me to be a Taiwanese-American?” and “what is important to me that I want people to see?”

Step 1: Be uncomfortable. Step 2: (Re)consider what is important to you and why. Step 3: Share with others the identities that are important to you. It helps them see you in your frame and it will help you see them in their own frame—a critical component of engaged learning and a representation of the most important aspects of this experience in Zambia.

All the best,

Grace