Day 7: Focusing on Commonalities, Not Differences

Hello friends and family!

I think I speak for a good portion of the group when I say sorry we haven’t been conversing with you much outside of this blog. As one might imagine, Wi-Fi can become harder to find the further you are from Lusaka.

            That being said I personally am finding that the separation from that stream of information we are all so used to is becoming an increasingly integral part of our experience. Enough of that though, you all probably want to hear how today went for us all.

            Today was our first full day at the Chikuni Mission, which I was surprised to learn encompasses almost 10 square km. We started our day early, celebrating a mass with the local boy’s secondary school at 7:30 am. It seems that as this trip is meant to be an exchange of the cultural and musical, it has also provided us ample opportunities to experience the different styles of worship that the Christians, more specifically Catholics, of Zambia have to offer. The ecclesiological models of institutionalism that many of us are so used to at home simply melt away to the passion of the faithful here. I will definitely be keeping track of the different ways of worship that we will have the opportunity to experience as we continue our journey.

            After mass and breakfast we started down the path to what has been one of my most anticipated experiences so far, a spiritual walk with Fr. Kalyepe. Fr. K is one of the eleven Jesuits that live and teach at the schools in the mission. Besides teaching and preaching however he has his own little project that he wanted to share with us. This project was the prayer garden, more accurately in my opinion a prayer walk/trail, that follows the life of St. Ignatius of Loyola. Across the eight stations we had the opportunity to remind ourselves of the founding father of not only the society of jesus but also of the way of thought that guides our institution.

            After this walk and our lunch we then had the opportunity to really meet for the first time the boys that we celebrated mass with in the morning. We gathered over music and even though we struggled at first to grasp some of the text of the spritual African music the boys were sharing, we came together in the end to finish the day with loud and joyous song. For myself personally, I was also able to make some friendships with the boys. One in particular, Sean a tenth-grader, stood out from the rest. Sean and I were able to connect on many levels, we’ve liked planes since we were small kids, we both have little sisters, we are both good at math etc. however we both agreed on one thing and it is perhaps the one thing I will always remember. We both agreed that while at school, we dearly miss our families. Sean is from Lusaka, which is about three hours away, and while he is here studying we only ever gets to see his family on “Visitor’s Weekend” (not to indifferent from our own fall family weekend tradition at GU). Regardless to say I am very much looking forward to talking to Sean some more tomorrow.

            That’s it for me. I hope everyone back home is healthy and well and that we have the chance to speak with our families alone soon.


-David Barnes, Mech. Engineering class of 2019

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Day 15: And so the trip ended, the journey continuing in heart and mind

In our first big group discussion that took place in Zambia, we were tasked with discovering our own personal answer to what our purpose was here in Zambia and Zimbabwe. I allowed myself to reflect on this question internally. I quickly discovered that this was a hard question. I didn’t really know where to start and so I sat there stumped and frowned at the ground. A few very long seconds passed until I came up with an easy way of processing it for myself. I simply asked myself a different questio n; ‘if you could describe to yourself why you are here in three words, what would they be?’ This was definitely a “duh” moment for me because this question of purpose suddenly became easy. I came here to experience, to share, and to love.             Today, I can very confidently state that this is exactly what I did. Experiencing and sharing walk hand in hand for me. Through singing and performing with local choirs we encountered our first cultural exchange. Through our daily activities,
Read more

Day 2: Table Talk

People who know me know that I love to have deep and intentional conversations around the dinner table (thank you, Jeff Dodd). That being said I was very excited tonight when, at our first dinner, I had a long conversation with the friends sitting by me about how we were feeling about this trip. Tired. Thankful. Anxious. Intrigued. Peaceful. These were several of the answers given tonight at dinner when asked, “what is one word that describes how you’re feeling right now?” Each of these answers were given by a different student who has embarked on this journey with me, and each time one of my friends elaborated on their choice of word I was inspired and excited about the journey that lies ahead of us. Tired. We made it. After a long two-day journey, our group has finally settled into the hostel that we will call home for the next five days before moving on to our next adventure. As I sit in the yellow common room writing this post, I hear nothing but the sounds of n
Read more

Day 5: This One's for the Girls

Image
Part I: Contemplation in Action             It hardly seems possible that today marked only our third full day in Lusaka, when I feel that I have experienced a greater depth of emotions that I would typically feel in weeks in the U.S. For me, much of our experiences here showcase the Jesuit ideal of “contemplation in action.” Typically this phrase encaptures three phases: an experience, a reaction, and a reflection. Most of the time, this mental process invigorates me as I am learning at a much more rapid rate than I would be in my own comfort zone. It reminds me of my semester abroad when I learned new French words each day, and I felt a warm-fuzzy sense of tangible learning through immersion. But sometimes, this three-step process prohibits me from experiencing moments in the present moment as my brain attempt to play catch-up and wonders why I’m feeling the ways that I am. This afternoon I experienced several of these moments, first at a wildlife preserve with a predominantly w
Read more