China: A decade later.

My first major trip was in 2008 when my parents planned to take my sister and I back to China to experience a little of the country from which we were born. I was still quite young at the time, maybe 12, but I remember many aspects of the trip that one would think
a kid would forget. 

It was about a two week trip, we started in Beijing and ended in Shanghai. Along the way we saw the mountains, the villages and most importantly the orphanage that we both spent almost a year in. We got to walk along the Great Wall of China, visit the Forbidden city and drive up the Yellow Mountains where Avatar happened to be filmed. All of which are attractions a tourist would be expected to see. We visited museums that housed the Terracotta warriors (Emperor Qinshihuang's Mausoleum Site Museum), ate traditional food (not the Westernized, American version of Chinese food) and explored a bat cave. We saw light shows and dances and not to brag but I did get to hold a panda.

We also happened to go right before the Olympics in Beijing so all of the mascots were being sold in every store and posted in every window. I'm sure I have a picture of my sister and I standing next to people dressed in costumes of them. 

My mom kept a journal almost every day we were away. I have never actually read through it but one day I will be able to read her written words on it (her recounts would be much more detailed and informative). However, we both agree that this was the most meaningful trip out of all the ones we have gone on as a family. It wasn't about lying on a beach or getting a tan, but rather a cultural immersion for us to witness aspects of the country before things started to change and become unrecognizable from when my parents traveled there 10 years prior.

When Patience Pays Off

I have always been interested in visual arts. As a child my family always knew for each major holiday that they couldn’t go wrong in gifting me a new colouring book. My sister and I used to make up games and scenarios where we treated a page in the book as though it were an assignment in our made-up school. Our favorite one was the Anne of Green Gables colouring book (we had identical ones) and I remember us acting as though dinner was the deadline to finish a page. 

As I grew older my parents enrolled us in local art classes, nothing technical, just fun ones that contained projects such as paper mâché or mixed media collages. There were only a couple of times that I took classes that focused on specifics, such as cartooning or sculpting. My mom always thought that I had a creative mind. When I first started university in business, she knew it would ultimately not satisfy my interests. I soon learned she was right and switched majors to communications and global studies. Luckily, they were ones that focused more on media and the world we live in and I am glad that those were the aspects that I continued to pursue.

On the side however, I continued to find new ways to keep art in my life. While in university I joined clubs that appealed to that. The most notable was my contributions and later management for the art and literary magazine on campus, Blueprint Magazine. Not only did I get to publish my writing, photography and artwork, but I also got to help design the final issues and shape the social media presence of the club. 

In my spare time, I tried to incorporate the more hands on aspects of visual arts and over the years I have resorted to painting as being that outlet. No teachings, and no lessons, the work that I produce are always somehow self-taught. I would give them as gifts, or my mom would take them and hang them around the house. One of them even made it onto her wall in the kitchen! Whenever someone asked me how long it took, I would always respond with 4-6 hours. They were shocked. My family would say to me that they wouldn't have the patience to sit for that long and work on one thing but for me the hours never seemed to drag, and my frustration never seemed to rise. It was as though I could keep putting paint on the canvas until I felt like it finally looked how I wanted it to. If that took hours, and meticulous detail and effort it didn't matter. At the end of the day when the paint dried and I was able to stand back and look at it, the feeling of accomplishment that ran through my body is one that drives me to want to experience it again and again.

Ghana: Service Learning or Voluntourism?

A contradiction that has presented itself throughout my Global Studies undergrad was the distinction between service learning and voluntourism. Ethics was always a major point of reference when analyzing the benefits of travelling abroad and offering our volunteer services. Are we taking away jobs? Why aren't we volunteering locally? Are we really providing the help they need? Are we taking advantage solely to use this experience to further our networking, careers and resume lists? These are all arguments that have been brought up by scholars and ones that I had to navigate throughout my Global Studies Experience (GSE) placement in Ghana. 

What Did I Do and Why I Was There? 

Two years ago, while attending university, an opportunity presented itself to travel to Accra, Ghana. The university called this opportunity an International Service Learning (ISL) placement as part of the GSE program. This one paired with the Queen Elizabeth II summer internship program in affiliation with the University of Ghana. This partnership allowed me to travel to Ghana for 3 months and intern at the Child Research and Resource Center (CRRECENT). My internship was primarily a research position in the Juvenile Justice Department with their overall focus being to try and determine the potential factors as to why children turn to delinquency and create programs and awareness to curve the issue. 

What Did They Gain? 

I found the placement pairing worthwhile and beneficial for both parties involved. I was able to provide a new perspective and was able to access resources, such as the University reserves, that they couldn’t. In addition, because I was delegated to researching potential cause and effects of juvenile delinquency, my findings can go on to support their programs or inform further research. I was able to harness skills learned throughout university such as academic writing and researching techniques in order to better inform the assignment at hand. This gave me a sense of usefulness, especially during the final dissemination of my findings where I got to share the results with the organization and various community members that they invited.

What Did I Gain? 

Even though this placement taught me that I don’t want a job focused solely on research, the experience still provided me with a chance to develop my academic skills and conduct critical research in a real-life context. It also gave me the opportunity to increase my social skills, intercultural competence, language skills, appreciation of cultural difference and a more experiential understanding of complex global problems. I was able to witness the inequalities, the structural barriers, and the way another country lives and organizes itself, and I can now apply this new knowledge to the rest of my schooling and life. It allowed me to harness social skills such as collaboration with an organization, speaking with community leaders (principals and teachers) and interacting with children. I gained a stronger sense of self through my ability to establish independence and navigate a new country and culture without my family and typical friends. And finally, I was able to gather experience to put on my resume and I was able to obtain a reference letter for future endeavors.

Service Learning or Voluntourism? 

In my opinion, I think that this experience was both voluntourism and service learning. This is because during the week my priority was going to my placement and getting my work done, however on the weekends I largely removed myself from that mindset and participated in more of the tourism aspects of the experience.  Although I would argue that both the placement and the weekend trips lead to different forms of learning. It also helped that I was immersed in Ghana for 3 months rather than only a week or two. I think the ISL placement can be service learning but is largely dependent on one’s genuine commitment to the experience. If one takes the tasks seriously and treats the placement with as much importance as school or a job, then the experience will be more fulfilling on both parts.

Overall, I think that the GSE program is a great opportunity because it combines both real world experience with the support of academic learning. I think this pairing better prepares a person to get the most out of their experience and it allows them to digest their experience upon return. In doing so, I think it becomes less of a “vacation” or “voluntourism” type trip where as soon as you get back you move on as though it barely happened. Actively having a space with which you reflect on the encounters and situations that arose throughout the placement is important, especially being able to do it with others who gone through a similar experience. In addition, the second part of the GSE program required each student to volunteer locally as well, therefore, reducing the ethical contradiction of why people are willing to travel abroad and volunteer but not dedicate that same time in their own community. Ultimately, the more thought and exposure that is given to the placement, the more likely it is for somebody to have a more meaningful reflection.