Statement of Purpose

Welcome to my blog "Cause this is AFRICA!!" If you wondering where the title came from, it's based off of a recent popular song. If you didn't pay any attention to the 2010 World Cup , you may not be familiar with the Shakira song "Waka Waka." If you don't know this song, I suggest you go look it up immediately! This song was the official song of the World Cup. It conveys a lot of hope for the continent. It is said that Africa is a forgotten continent, and I do believe this saying in a lot of ways. Not only has it been subject to colonialism, war, and oppression, it has been subject to a lot of poor rulers, badly enacted policies, and sundry other foreign and domestic issues.

This is just one more account of observations.

A lot of people asked me about why I wanted to go to Africa. And besides all the obvious answers (the awesome teachers, my best friends applying, interesting subject matter, etc.), I also think it's important to know about the people who share a planet with you. Regardless of income, socioeconomic status, ethnicity, race, gender, sexuality, etc., we all share the same emotions. We get angry with life's injustices, we cry when we're upset, we fall in love when someone or something touches our hearts. Our differences lie in our manifestations of these underlying emotions. My goal is to be able to come back to the United States with lots of stories about the people and places I go. Because you can't understand the world if you only have one story. Let's face it! To understand a single life, you have to understand a whole world of stories! My story is completely different from your story, from the South African story, from the Afrikaner story, from the Zulu story, from the kudu-who-was-eaten-by-the-Afrikaner-and-the-Zulu story. My hope is that like the song Waka Waka, you will listen to this story, but understand that it does not show the whole picture. Critique it! challenge it! Engage in discussion with me the things I see and the people with whom I talk. Tell me your experiences as I tell you mine.

Maybe, together, we can come to understand each other and paint this story together.