World School
----where we stand as one
FengJiaWei，Soochow University，China
I want to start off my article with my gratitude for the incredible hospitality I fortunately received in Russia as an honored World School student. Thanks to the Far Eastern Federal University where I had one of my precious and meaningful memories in my life. Thanks to those lovely World School staff, all the enthusiastic participants including teachers, organizers, performers etc. And I’m also really grateful to my host family of extraordinary kindness.
Left 1: Feng Jiawei
It’s been about 3 weeks after we saying farewell to each other. Life itself seems to turn back to old usual school routine and with bunches of school class and homework left behind while we were absent. Before the trip to Vladivostok, I wouldn’t believe it that 12 days’ stay is long enough to change an individual so deeply. But in fact, World School did convince me of that and has changed me beyond my imagination.
I can still recall those scenes of the first arrival day. It can be easily found that there are more or less some kind of hesitation for some students to just say hello, introduce oneself or exchange Facebook、Instagram. To be honest, I was one of them too. Sometimes there is silence over lunch tables and we just stay in “domestic” only tend to talk and sit beside our mates. However, These circumstances disappeared in just a few days. Ultimately, all the delegations stand as one.
Instead of hesitating, I started to talk confidently and genuinely. And that helps me to be fully involved in every activities. I managed to get rid of all the worries about languages and useless concerns. I have learned how important it is to be initiative. That’s the biggest change on me. Take one step forward if you think you’re capable of doing something, and always be ready to take any possible opportunities. All that matters is to make your voice heard, your opinions considered and your work admitted.
I still remember the conversation that I had with a girl from England who has become a close friend of mine on Facebook now. She asked me some questions about China. Based on her school textbook in UK, she thought that China has a unique politic of communism which is related to exactly same income per capita、death penalty、non-democracy、weird government etc. implying that China is a scary country to live in. And she was very surprised when I made it clear that none of these is true. So, it’s actually high number of negative doubts or anxieties about China which I think is not just misinformed but also misleading. I’m just taking China as an example and I think similar conversations of other countries are taking place every minute around the world.
After that day I was wondering what if someday I have a same conversation with a guy from other country which I’m not familiar with. Is it possible for me to communicate without prejudice or bias? Not really. So I think it’s more important than ever for us to consider carefully about what we’ve known and what we’re going to do. Because after all that’s the purpose of WS. Just like Mr. Matsudaira said that we’re chosen for a mission to be able to think independently and make our own decisions. World School is a whole picture and a mosaic at the same time. When you look close, you can also tell different colors and patterns of each culture in detail.
Personally, I want to help others accelerate the understanding of China and vice versa. In the age of instability and intolerance, the artificial confines have kept us apart way too long. For a moment, if we could just disregard governments, media, textbooks, just for the sake of the argument, with our tools of critical thinking, can we build the relation that actually sees one another as individual human beings and not faceless members of a particular ethnicity or nationality? Of course we can!
Tearing down all the barriers we’ve created so that we can show each others our doubts, our confusions, our hopes, our dreams. And it turns out in the end that Stand As One is achievable.
2014/10/22
