First Day of Class

Monday, June 30, 2008

First of all, I would just like to say that I’ve really enjoyed all the time I have had lately to write. With the normal life I lead, it’s rare that I find anytime to just sit down and free-write, which I really love to do. But living without a television, without a cell phone, with extremely limited (and slow!) internet access, and in a city in which almost everything closes by 6pm because it’s really dangerous to go out after sunset, has lent me a lot more time to be able to express my thoughts.

Our first day of the institute was started today. I was wrong in my last entry – today’s speaker was not from the ICTR (that’s later in the week) but the Director of the Foreign Service Institute of Kenya, and the former Deputy Secretary General of the East African Union (EAC), Dr. Cheluget. He gave a very brief history of the East African region, its conflicts, and why they created the EAC. Afterwards, the class asked him a lot of questions, concerning the future of the EAC, how they are fighting corruption in government, about the stability of the region, etc. I felt like the class was asking really tough questions – which is a good thing, for sure. But I couldn’t help but to feel a certain sadness during the session… so much conflict in the region, so many bad regimes that are influencing (and destroying) the lives of so many people. While there has been a lot of progress made, things can turn around for the worse in an instant – like the tampered elections that occurred in Kenya back in January which launched the country into violence. I really admired Dr. Cheluget because while he did not come right out and say it, I know that he must feel a strong calling to make his country, and his region, the very best that it can be, thus his career working in the foreign service and as a diplomat. It takes real courage not to take the easy way out and abandon your home when the going gets tough, but to work hard to make it better. In fact, being here over the past week has made me realize how much I appreciate my own home, America.

Now, don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of things that I do not like about America (I’ll spare you my potentially controversial criticisms knowing my blog audience), but I love America. I love being an American. The more that I learn about other countries, the more I start to appreciate the freedoms and opportunities that we often take for granted. For example, in discussing the cultures of Tanzania and Uganda with two fellow students in the program who are from those places, I have learned that it’s not only legal, but culturally acceptable to hit your wife. It’s also known that if you are openly homosexual, you could easily be stoned to death. Yes, this is very real in 2008. Hearing these things puts a lot into perspective – obviously we still have great strides to make in continuing to build on gay rights and women’s rights, but it’s certainly not legal, or socially acceptable, to do those heinous things. So while I have definitely had my moments where it has been hard to love America and been hard for me to feel especially proud or patriotic, my love for my country has never wavered. America has given me so much – which is why I feel that I need to share my gifts with other people in the world.

Not that I think the “American way is the only way” and that “everyone should believe the same things as me” and “everyone should fit into this mold” and blah blah blah – no. What I think is that I have been given a great education and some economic capacity, and that I should use these resources to help other people gain these invaluable resources in their own lives. How I can do this and what economic and political models are the best to implement? Well, those are still questions I am asking myself. Socialism, Capitalism, Democracy, Communism… it’s all just so overwhelming. I read all these books, study all these theories, look at all these case studies… And just like I tend to see the good in all people, I see the good things that each viewpoint can offer; but I still don’t know what’s “best” or what’s “right.” All I do know is that freedom, equality, liberty and human dignity matter – that’s what America has taught me. And that is what I want to share with the world, because the whole world deserves it – not just me. Maybe that is the best that I can do.