Pre Solyia Reflection-High Expectations

Welcome again to our favorite blog post of the day!

Today’s blog is unique. Do you know why? Today, I am going to share my expectations for Solyia. Of course, you are asking now what is Solyia? Solyia is an intercultural video dialog integrated with a course I am currently enrolled in with Dr. Maha Bali named “Digital Literacies, AI Literacy & Intercultural Learning”. But as you know this will be a great opportunity for me as I will discuss different topics with different people from different backgrounds and cultures. But guess what? This will finally allow me to expand my circle INTERNATIONALLY !! You can register for Solyia through this link: https://www.exchangeportal.net/connect-program-student-registration-si.

In this Blog, I will discuss the readings, videos and even activities under the umbrella of intercultural approaches that we made in class to prepare for the Solyia event. The first reading that I liked the most is the reading of Lina Monzer named “War in Translation: Giving Voice to the Women of Syria.” You can access the article through this link “https://via.hypothes.is/https://lithub.com/war-in-translation-giving-voice-to-the-women-of-syria/“. This reading eventually triggered my emotions. The way she narrated what happened to her was like “war changes the laws of physics, bending time and space to its will.” Another quote, “Our daughter did not die because of a bullet or mortar shell or carbomb, like my father, sister, brother, cousin, mother, neighbor, pharmacist, teacher. She died because the siege had cut off not only our food and electricity, but also our medicine and medical supplies.” These 2 quotes made me imagine myself in the refugees’ shoes questioning myself several questions: If something wrong happened, who Can I run to and talk to? This reading allowed me to build an entirely different picture of the refugees who have different backgrounds and different culture. Eventually, they have a disturbed daily routine. Not even disturbed but brutal one to wake up and start praying not to die and help others to survive. These people will have different pictures and perspectives of things. I believe they will see life differently, like differently abled people who are blind each have his own special abilities. The refugees have endurance and mental strength that typically will not be evident in a society with a normal routine without having the burden of living. I can link this reading to the activity we played in front of SSE Building here at AUC, where each one had a different type of personality with different hobbies, religion, background, and gender. In this game, Dr.Maha Bali managed to ask questions, and the ones who are privileged managed to step forward and the ones who do not have the advantage took a step backward. I had cards of being Muslim, playing music, Male, and Low-income level. However, in the end, my friends who had refugees managed to be at the end of the hall literally. If I can say something about this,  I learnt that each group of people have their own powers and picture of life. I want to raise a question: If I met a refugee in the Soliya, I would ask him “How are you really feeling when you are away from your land, your home, your room? How did you feel? How are you viewing life now? I can ensure you that their perspective on life will be 180 degrees different than any other one who is in his house in his home country, including me. I am looking forward to hearing the answer to my questions. The second video that I really liked is the one by Taiye Selasi named ” Don’t ask where I’m from, ask where I’m local” and this is the link to watch it ” https://www.ted.com/talks/taiye_selasi_don_t_ask_where_i_m_from_ask_where_i_m_a_localDon’t ask where I’m from, ask where I’m local” This video allowed me to learn that anyone can be intercultural. One’s nationality does not define one’s culture. What really defines a person’s culture is the experience he shares throughout his life, whether in his country or in another one. For example, If I went to Zimbabwe and settled there for 1 month, for sure I am going to build Zimbabwean habits to adapt to the culture; thus, I would have another culture in me, which is the Zimbabwean and Egyptian! Taiye Selasi’s talk was a unique one, and I recommend watching or listening to it. I believe that she will highlight things you did not feel before, like what happened to me. But I have a question: is the intercultural person biased to his original culture or the new ones? or city depends on the place he’s settling in? Soliya will help me to discover this by contacting different people, allowing me to infer their original culture. Watch it and let me know your opinion! I can foresee in the Solyia that I can meet a Latin student however with asian culture. I am really excited to go through such an experience!  The third  video is from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie about the danger of a single story, and this is the link so you can watch it: https://www.ted.com/talks/chimamanda_adichie_the_danger_of_a_single_story” This video by Adichie allowed me to wonder why we as africans always see westerns as the GOATS of this world; however we have our own identity and we may me even better. But as she mentioned in the talk about the mangos. We have been brainwashed to think for them, not for us. This may be a bit , metaphoric as we work for them involuntarily. However, this talk made me think of different questions. How do Westerners see us? Do they really see Africans holding spears and running after the deer to hunt? Or are they seeing us as Pharaohs living in the yellow dusty desert with no technology? Solyia will help me answer these questions as we will meet Western people and we will have discussions regarding these questions that were stated earlier. Let me share with you a case I encountered weeks ago in university. We had the international day, and I was standing beside an American student. The student was booing all African and Arab countries until America stood out and started chanting “USA!” I actually asked him why so? He told me that we are far behind the US. So, Soliya will help me pull the thread for this issue to start thinking of a solution for this issue. The Fourth video I really liked is Jay Smooth’s talk named “How to tell someone they sound racist” and the link to watch it is “https://youtu.be/b0Ti-gkJiXc” This talk focused on different approaches to understanding people. Smooth focused on what the person said, not who they really are. I agree much with this as a man is a man with what he says not how he looks. However, questions were raised: Do people really go with this principle? Do people like or dislike people according to their looks or their words? If there are people from different cultures communicating, will they focus on the meeting of the mind and the words or will one’s appearance define their destiny? These are questions that need answers. Solyia will help me as I will have better intercultural maturity by meeting different people. I will test how they will approach me. Will they communicate based on looks or minds and discussions? I can assure you that the Solyia experience will get me better exposed to other cultures that will lead to develop my emotional intelligence while dealing with different people as well.

And now let us talk about my thoughts. Who am I, really? How do I view the world? Me, Marwan, a person who is living to give and share peace in life. All what I need is to see peace surrounding my environment. Over the years, I discovered that I am detail-oriented, and competitive. I like structure, efficiency, and results. This course has added to me a lot by allowing me to live and imagine other people’s lives, and this was evident in the games we played, like Spent https://playspent.org/, and BBC refugees https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-32057601. This allowed me to imagine their lives and try to survive my own decisions. Maybe these 2 games added to my personality that I need to be aware of all possible elements around me in order to survive in this world. However, taking these possibilities into consideration and having faith in ALLAH that everything happens is good for me; definitely will allow me to tackle life with a braver heart than ever. However, I always question myself: Did I fulfill my purpose in life? Am I on the right track? Do I leave a small impact on the people I meet? These are questions that will be answered along the years , but Solyia will put me on the right track and will allow me to catch the thread by interacting with different people and seeing their reactions. Maybe I can manage to make friends out of this opportunity. The bottom line, Marwan is still under construction as any human being with questions evolves with no answers. Will he know the answer or part of the answer after Solyia? Most probably yes. Why not the full answer? Nothing is perfect and 100% in life; as long as we grow ,we grow. I believe my identity can affect the people positively, as I am willing to seek a win win approach in the conversation. Also, by having such conversations, being Egyptian,Arab and African may alter others opinions on us to being a positive one. Thus, my identity will speak up at first. I expect some caution from people at the beginning, but I can assure you guys that constructive conversations will be built. And who knows, I may mention here a friend I made from Solyia after the Solyia experience ! Solyia also will allow me to enhance myself knowledge by knowing if I am biased to certain type of cultures or people or not. I find this as a good opportunity to exploit and discover myself more!

And now, let’s talk about the interaction with people who are different from me, let’s start with my classmates. In the class we are not the same at all, however, I always respect my class mate opinion. This allows me to listen more and then be proactive to search beyond his words and have better knowledge that will lead to having better experience in the long term. This point will allow me to classify myself as a global citizen. I listen to everybody’s point of view, I constantly research and I question the fact of being a global citizen. How can I enhance my ability to be a better global citizen? Should I put effort in learning more languages so that I can make other people feel more comfortable? Should I start searching for the signature recipe for each country to create relevance between me and the other person? Or should I include a habit from each country in my daily life to ensure that I am a good global citizen? I believe Solyia’s experience will help me tremendously to achieve the global citizen goal by allowing me to meet with different people. Each person I will know his identity, and I will try to create relevance by knowing the signature recipe of his country, try to talk his language, and even I may help them talk in Arabic. Thus, mutual benefit is applied ! In order to do this, I hope that Solyia would provide me with information about the people that I will meet with in order to prepare myself for an extraordinarily experience to discover people.

As we know, our brothers and sisters in Palestine are suffering these days due to the Israeli attacks. If the Palestine topic was opened, I believe Arabs would be defensive and a bit offensive. This may be deduced as the events happening are devastating. The Westerners would be okay with it, as I believe they do not really care about this subject matter. If I am in the position to direct the talk, I would not be offensive but rather be considerate so that I can send the message clearly to them. I can create relevance by the California Fire to what is happening in Palestine. I believe this would make them understand a bit. However, this issue needs prolonged discussions that will include somehow in it the quantum merit principle. What do we as Westerners get for the cease-fire in Palestine or even considering the issue. This will need good preparation, and I hope one day to live in a peaceful world. The support I might need would somehow be from history, or even humane evidence would be enough. At the end, we are humans, and I still believe everyone may have a tiny piece of goodness in his heart. So, when the discussion may occur I may target this tiny spot using Logos and Ethos. Showing statistics and the sufferings may be sufficient to change one’s mind. Lets take a moment and pray for our brothers and sisters in Palestine.

That is our Blog for today! I hope you enjoyed it. I will dive into the Solyia experience and let you know after I finish how was it, really !

Until Next Blog,

Your Friend,

Marwan.