It’s hard to describe what my summer has been like here in Kenya, which is partially why I have avoided blogging at all since May. It’s hard to completely explain the projects I’m working on (without making you read more than you’d want to) and It’s hard to explain the lifestyle that I’m enjoying here in Mombasa, all in a few hundred words or less. But most of all, I’ve avoided trying to put things into words because I have no idea how to explain in easy terms just how much fun living here is. [insert italtics and other normal html features in there as you see fit. I would do it for you if this computer could do that much.]
So I want to blog and I want to put something out there. Kenya’s pretty cool place, and there’s probably something I could say that would contribute to building the UBC experience (already, the greatest thing on earth). So please bare with me as I try to get back to my Tokyo Police Club in an Airport roots and producing content for this blog. So where to start? Well, my primary audience for this blog is new to UBC and prospective students, so whenever I write something here, I always try to think if there was one thing I really wanted to share with you, what that would be?
So I’ve thought of my one thing that I want to share. Everyday I make an effort to read the Globe and Mail online to keep connected to Canada. The article that really stuck out to me a few weeks ago was this one (and bare with me, I cannot hyperlink anything, so you are getting a long URL link to paste into your browser):
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/time-to-lead/my-name-is-michael-ignatieff-and-i-am-canadian/article2079267/
In short, it’s an article by Michael Ignatieff, who speaks to what our generation has become. I’ll copy the part that for me, is everything I see UBC as, and that is a community of students who know where the world is going and want to be out there “in the heart of the action.”
Dearest Iggy said,
“The next generation is quietly redefining what it means to be a Canadian. They’re ignoring the attack ads and the chatter from the schoolyard of Ottawa politics. So many of the young Canadians I meet want to be global citizens. They want to be expatriates. They want a life that includes a couple of years in Mumbai or Shanghai, a summer teaching English in Tanzania, a year or longer working for some company in South Korea.
Young Canadians know which way the world is going, and they want to be out there, at the heart of the action. They are thinking about what a good life looks like and they know a good life might take them beyond our borders. Some won’t come home again, but others will, because they realize being away made them more Canadian, not less.
If this is the way the world is going, and our identity is changing, then the job for the Canadians who stay behind will be to make sure our children do want to come home again.”
Maybe that kind of describes my summer better than a long blog post could. Even more, to me, it describes the students at UBC to me and it describes who I am as a person. Currently, I’m in Kenya for the summer and returning to UBC for a term before I take part in a Go Global exchange to Australia in term 2. I want to be out there where the action is, participating, going as many places as possible, and then when I come home I know UBC and Vancouver has become the place I want to go home to.
Maybe now that I’ve gotten started, I will blog more and share some stories before this summer is over. I do have to say, I am really excited to get back to UBC and spend another year in Totem Park. I’ve never felt more connected to a place before like I have to UBC and Vancouver (sorry Ontario).
Asante sana for coping with my URL link.