Gotta Love Community

Ash Wednesday. It’s officially Ash Wednesday and a few people in the house are giving up speaking English for Lent. YIKES! Oh, did I mention that Jessalyn and I are doing this as well? So, now I will be writing the blog in Spanish and you guys can copy and paste it into an online translator. Esta bien?

Ok ok. Estoy bromando (I’m joking). The exceptions are, of course, when I am writing, when I am communicating with people back home, and when I am talking to someone who only speaks English. So if you fall under one of those categories then you can go ahead and CHILL OUT because I’m not going to speak to you and Spanish (well, not only in Spanish at least).

Though most of us do not come from religious backgrounds in which we practiced Lent, many of us took this as an opportunity to practice spiritual discipline with the accountability and support that comes from living in community.Six of us in the house are giving up English and we are excited about the outcome. What? Only 40 days? I thought this was supposed to be a challenge.

(Side note: Jessalyn is annoying the heck out of me right now. She won’t quit talking in Spanish and I am clearly doing something more important than listening to her. I thought maybe when we had to speak only in Spanish, it would make her shut up. Oh contraire! She says it’s fun. To which I responded, “Sí—AHORA” (yeah—NOW). I love that Hessaljean.)

Because I obviously have a limited vocabulary, there will be many times when I just do not speak; I’ll have to be silent and listen—two spiritual disciplines about which I could stand to learn a lesson or two. Also, Jess and I were talking about how we really want this to be a time when we ask for God’s help with even things such as the ability to recall what we've learned and learn quickly what we haven't. And, because I will not be able to express how I feel as well with people, this causes more of a desire and need within me to express how I feel about things to God.

Ok, I want to tell you guys a little bit about living in community. It’s hard. Thank you. Join us next time for “Profound Thoughts from Kara DuBose.”

Man, I’m such a jokester. Seriously though, I think I speak for everyone in both our Oxford study abroad group and this Latin America group, when I say that there is so much to learn from living in close quarters with the same people day-in and day-out. We eat almost all meals together, have hours of classes together each day, sit in the same rooms to do homework, share the same bathrooms, go to museums together, church together, together, together, together. This forces us to uncover things about ourselves that we don’t like and that we have never had to deal with before. And, it becomes even easier to spot the tiniest things in other people that really just peeve you. (If you don’t know what la palabra “peeve” means, you should probably go look it up and then find as many times as possible to work it into conversation. You’d be surprised at how fun it is to use.)

Anyway, needless to say, we have had our share disagreements here about the way things should be done and run which is inevitable in a group of 24 people with 24 different opinions and goals. It does not take long in an atmosphere such as this to realize when people are disgruntled (also a good word to incorporate into every day language). The Walkers and the Sanders decided last week that this Tuesday’s chapel/house meeting would be for the sole purpose of addressing questions or concerns about how this semester is going. They asked that the questions and concerns be submitted beforehand so that they could sort through the most important things to address and think about how they could change things or how they could help us understand why certain things are just the way they are.

I was nervous before this morning’s meeting because I thought that people might just blurt out hasty comments or be disrespectful. This assumption comes mainly from the way I have seen conflict dealt with in the past; with lack of respect and refusal to look at things from someone else’s perspective. I feel pretty good about the way things went this morning. Wimon and Shelly addressed some of the main issues people were having with classes, homework, free time, curfew, and scheduled events and, in my opinion, they really listened to what the students had to say. A few times people commented or asked for clarity and the dialogue was healthy—In my opinion, the only thing worse than miscommunication is no communication. Naturally, faculty and students are all going to have different goals for what they want to get out of study abroad, and today I think we met in the middle. It helped to hear their perspectives and because they listened to ours, they actually took some of our suggestions and implemented some changes. It’s hard to remember sometimes that the people in charge have a lot of responsibility and that they are trying to think about the best way to do things for the benefit of the whole. On the flip-side, it’s so easy to see my current frustration over the general perspective. I’ve been frustrated at times this semester and I’m sure that something will really peeve me again, but it is good to know that I can voice my concerns and talk them when they come up. It is so unique to be in a place where the authority figures actually encourage and invite feedback and suggestions.

I think this semester is only going to get better and better as we learn how to deal with each others’ weaknesses and nurture each others’ strengths. Oh, by the way, if that’s what a lifetime of marriage looks like, you can count me out.

ESTOY BROMANDO AGAIN! Sort of…

Over and out,

Kara Dawn