I am really
uncool.
I know, all my friends in the
audience are thinking, “No, Sara, you're the coolest.” Thanks, you guys, but no, I’m really the
furthest thing from cool. I do things
like spend hours reorganizing my book shelf by subject, and then by author, and
then by the date I first read each book and by how profoundly it changed my life because
I find that fun. There are days when I
would rather read a twenty-page dissertation on the nuances of one sentence by
one author than go out with friends.
When I went to Thailand, I bought a cowboy hat. You know, like the hats they wear in old
country western movies from America. One
of those. But not just any cowboy
hat. This hat has a chin strap, so I
don’t lose it, and it says Thailand in big, bold letters on the front. Yeah, I’m really uncool.
My students
think I’m the coolest, though. I would
love to attribute this to the idea that I am a genius at being a teacher, that
I have incredible acumen when it comes to leading choral speaking(1), or to the
idea that my whiteboard-writing capabilities are just awe-inspiring. But although I hope these things hold some
truth, I know that my kids think I’m the coolest largely because I’m
different. I don’t teach the
curriculum. I encourage my students to
get up from their desks. I give them
high-fives. And perhaps most obvious
upon first seeing me, I am… pretty tall for a woman in Southeast Asia. I’m different, and they know it.
I’m going to
take a minute now to talk about difference.
Before I came to
Malaysia, I thought I was the most open-minded person. I took pride in my mental liberality. I didn’t really know open-mindedness as a
global citizen, though.
Let me just
quickly put this into terms that everyone can relate to. Food. To
put it in terms of food, you don’t really know open-mindedness until, as an
American, you take that first bite of pedas(2) fried rice and find yourself crunching on those ubiquitous, salty dried
anchovies for the first time. For
context, coming from America, eating dried anchovies is an entirely new
experience for most of us. For even more
context, in America, I never ate seafood.
Not even the deep-fried-covered-in-sauce-it-doesn’t-even-look-or-taste-like-fish-anymore
kind of seafood. So that first bite of spice-surrounded,
dried anchovy was more than a surprise for me.
The second time
I had dried anchovies, I was more prepared.
I was with a teacher from my school who has asked me to call her kakak(3).
She had cooked the spicy dish I was about to taste. And that’s when it hit me—you don’t really know open-mindedness until
someone hands you a plate chock-full of anchovies and says, with an eager gleam
in her eye, “Eat.” You don’t know
open-mindedness until you really, honestly try to savor that foreign taste
because the excitement in kakak’s
face says she would be so, so happy if you loved it. You don’t know open-mindedness until you
chomp the head from the dried body and lick the salt from the backside of your
teeth and… savor the textures of the stories that kakak is telling you as she stands before you, as she describes her
mother’s crinkled, smiling face and her mother’s expertise at cooking exactly.
this. dish. Her own face crinkles as she
smiles into the memory of family gatherings, as she speaks about connections
with family over teh tarik(4) and
anchovy-topped fried rice. Kakak tells of the first time she cooked
this recipe for her now deceased husband.
When she mentions him, her voice gains a soft lilt. Her eyes glance to the sky.
You don’t know
another person or their culture until you really look at them, really listen to
them. You don’t see the role that
something new to you plays in another person’s life until you open yourself to
it. I most likely would not have learned about
the central role that traditional Malaysian dishes play in kakak’s life, in her memories, in her ability to gather her family
together if I hadn’t fully opened myself to the new experience of tasting those
dishes.
Open-mindedness.
Fulbright has
opened my mind in ways that weren’t even conceivable to me before I arrived in
this country.
When we first
moved to our placements in Malaysia, us ETAs found ourselves in environments that
were simply different for us, interacting with people who knew nothing about us
and very little about our culture. When
you are in this kind of space, reference points for who you are don’t carry the
same weight as they do in your home country.
There is no shared context to fall back on in your interactions. You have to really invest, really work to see
all the new things around you. You have
to do this so you can understand. You have to do this so you can be understood.
I think that
this is a perfect example of a space where genuine, deep learning can
happen. The kind of learning that can
profoundly impact your consciousness if only simply because it’s all new. And when you learn something completely new,
you can look back on how you perceived the world before that moment and say,
“That is not all.”
There are
multiple ways of knowing the world, of seeing the world, and this, this is what
cultural exchange is about. This is what
Fulbright has, in part, been about.
As Fulbright
ETAs, we are constantly having to think about what impact we’re having on our
students, about what role we play in the educational system and larger social context here in Malaysia.
I think we have
a special opportunity here. When we
carry the lessons we ourselves learn about learning—about opening our own minds
and genuinely, deeply learning—when we carry these lessons from outside the
walls of the classroom to the space of the desk and the whiteboard, we are able
to teach more than English speaking skills.
We are able to create conditions for the kind of learning that you don’t
invest in only for the output of a grade—and not only because we can’t give
grades. We are able to have the kind of
exchange that encourages students and teachers alike to really look at each
other, to really listen to each other.
The kind of exchange that fosters global consciousness and true
open-mindedness.
A quote from the
American librarian and museum director John Cotton Dana seems relevant
here. Dana said, “Who dares to teach
must never cease to learn.”
ETAs talk about
our experiences with each other a lot—and, trust me, we are learning. We are all in the process of learning,
whether that learning be about Malaysian culture, about becoming better
teachers, about becoming better globally-aware human beings, or simply about
ourselves.
Fulbright has
done this for us, and we are only halfway through our grant.
So to take a
lesson from my students, I’m going to sum this all up with a word that they are
fond of. For us ETAs, Fulbright Malaysia
has been, quite simply:
Best.
Best.
 |
| Mano, who served as executive director of MACEE in the '70s and as the emcee at the gala, myself, and my lovely roommate Shannon, who dispelled any beginnings of butterflies I had with warmth and hilarity. Thanks, Shan. <3 **Not pictured but also awesome at encouragement: Owen Cortner, speech master. |
(1) Choral speaking is an art form unique to Malaysia intended to help students develop standardized English pronunciation skills. Watching choral speaking is an extreme cultural experience in itself. FMI: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5pcEGltSIs
(2) "Pedas" translates to "spicy" in English. Everything here is pedas.
(3) "Kakak" translates to "big sister" in English.
(4) Teh tarik (which translates to "pulled tea") is a traditional Malaysian drink made with sweetened condensed milk and black tea. The liquid is "pulled" or poured repeatedly from one cup to another until a froth, not unlike that found on a latte, forms on the top. It is delicious and incredibly sweet and probably the root of many ETA cavities and cavities-to-be.
