Reflecting on my experiences with cultural communities in the past has shown me how closely this journey has mirrored developing film. A process that starts off in the dark, but begins to evolve sheets of film into captured moments. Moments that with hindsight offer clarity to my understanding and the necessary modifications to my perspective. Moments of my childhood could be found in an Ethiopian household, during a time where my cultural identity was reinforced by my parents and Ethiopian community. Soon after leaving home for boarding school, my lens dilated, offering exposure to cultures stretching throughout North Carolina and beyond. Now at Duke, it’s truly been exciting engaging in conversations that flow between languages of academics, culture, and more.
As I continue to develop my intercultural competence I hope to focus on two overarching themes- Self Improvement alongside Community Impact. My steps towards improving myself align with advice based of my IDI (Intercultural Development Inventory) report. Through an intercultural journal, I hope to continue to reflect on past experiences along with future means of engagement with an adaptive mindset. I am also aiming for a high community impact which can be measured through the significance and scale of the project. The successful implementation of community events hosted on campus for both domestic and international students would be a sign of achieving this. I also look forward to being paired with a language partner and finding a new perspective through our encounters.
Ling Jin
Hi Ezra, thank you so much for sharing your past cross-cultural experiences and your goals for this year in the Global Fellows Program. I like that you have community impact as one of your goals – self-improvement wouldn’t be of too much use if we don’t have the community in mind, while we cannot achieve meaningful impact on the community without starting from our self-reflection and work. It’s great that because of your background, you have had a lot of cross-cultural experiences, therefore, the challenge for you is to reflect on those experiences and think about what you can learn from them. A lot of times, people think that cross-cultural exposure can automatically be turned into growth, but in reality, one will have to do the hard work of reflecting and analyzing. I look forward to learning more about what you will gain from the program!