It is Spring Break. The students were excited for this break...so were the teachers. It is a phenomenon that occurs at every school. Everyone likes a holiday.
Before our holiday could begin, the school hosted an Egyptian Culture Day. It was perfect timing really; in Social Studies we had been discussing culture as I mentioned in a previous post. I used Egyptian Culture Day as an example.
It was remarkable really. The planning was really well done. Students sang, danced and played instruments. They brought in musicians and dancers from outside the school. There was an abundance of Egyptian food, and, most everyone was dressed in traditional Egyptian dress.
A couple posts ago, I talked about the onion and the layers of culture. This Egyptian Culture Day was the skin of the onion. It had all the bells and whistles of an entertaining afternoon, but, as I have been teaching the grade 7`s, there is so much more to culture than the skin!
The afternoon was essentially a 3 hour celebration of culture a la Folklorama. It solidified the idea that we identify cultural perspective with the outer skin; judging a book by its cover. Just like the onion, with hidden layers, culture is the same, so why is it hidden in Cultural celebrations! While all these thoughts ran through my head, I also thought about why we buy certain fruits, vegetables and onions. We inspect their skin, look for blemishes and then, we decide whether we want to buy it or not. What you see is what you get...usually. That is the purpose of the outside skin. It lets people know what to expect and to decide if they want to invest in what they see.
It becomes the choice of the onlooker to decide if they want to buy in to what they see. It is quite clear that we have invested in what we have seen here in Egypt. We have invested in the lives of students, the people around us and the people we work with. We have invested time, energy and effort. We have invested hours doing research, marking papers and pushing forwards when sometimes we just want to stay home. We have decided, based on what we have seen, to invest in the lives of the people here. Through all the effort and time spent building relationships, I truly feel like, as on onlooker of this culture, that I have started seeing the inside layers of the onion.
I have spent a lot of time talking about and reflecting on onions. When I want to prepare a soup, I cut the onion in half and immediately see all the layers. That is the one thing that cannot be done with people and with culture. You will never see the inside layers without the investment of time into building relationships. People will not share their inner thoughts, beliefs and values with you, if, they do not sense that you really, truly care. It is only with time, that the layers of culture begin to expose themselves. It truly is a fascinating adventure.
With all that in mind, it was a wonderful afternoon. Let the pictures speak for themselves.
Before our holiday could begin, the school hosted an Egyptian Culture Day. It was perfect timing really; in Social Studies we had been discussing culture as I mentioned in a previous post. I used Egyptian Culture Day as an example.
It was remarkable really. The planning was really well done. Students sang, danced and played instruments. They brought in musicians and dancers from outside the school. There was an abundance of Egyptian food, and, most everyone was dressed in traditional Egyptian dress.
A couple posts ago, I talked about the onion and the layers of culture. This Egyptian Culture Day was the skin of the onion. It had all the bells and whistles of an entertaining afternoon, but, as I have been teaching the grade 7`s, there is so much more to culture than the skin!
The afternoon was essentially a 3 hour celebration of culture a la Folklorama. It solidified the idea that we identify cultural perspective with the outer skin; judging a book by its cover. Just like the onion, with hidden layers, culture is the same, so why is it hidden in Cultural celebrations! While all these thoughts ran through my head, I also thought about why we buy certain fruits, vegetables and onions. We inspect their skin, look for blemishes and then, we decide whether we want to buy it or not. What you see is what you get...usually. That is the purpose of the outside skin. It lets people know what to expect and to decide if they want to invest in what they see.
It becomes the choice of the onlooker to decide if they want to buy in to what they see. It is quite clear that we have invested in what we have seen here in Egypt. We have invested in the lives of students, the people around us and the people we work with. We have invested time, energy and effort. We have invested hours doing research, marking papers and pushing forwards when sometimes we just want to stay home. We have decided, based on what we have seen, to invest in the lives of the people here. Through all the effort and time spent building relationships, I truly feel like, as on onlooker of this culture, that I have started seeing the inside layers of the onion.
I have spent a lot of time talking about and reflecting on onions. When I want to prepare a soup, I cut the onion in half and immediately see all the layers. That is the one thing that cannot be done with people and with culture. You will never see the inside layers without the investment of time into building relationships. People will not share their inner thoughts, beliefs and values with you, if, they do not sense that you really, truly care. It is only with time, that the layers of culture begin to expose themselves. It truly is a fascinating adventure.
With all that in mind, it was a wonderful afternoon. Let the pictures speak for themselves.
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