Molly's reminded of how many different parts there are to culture

When I first applied to this program, I was worried that I would end up going into Cape Town without knowing much about the city or its history, and that I would be thrown into an organization that I didn’t really have any way of helping. I’m still not an expert on Cape Town, but I think that the Ted talks and other videos about teens and young adults in Cape Town who are taking their Matrics and trying to improve their communities helped me understand where I might fit in to Cape Town’s equation. Yes, I’ll be working with an organization that works to improve the lives of refugees and the community as a whole, but those videos reminded me that I’m not supposed to be the future of Cape Town - that role will be filled by Cape Town’s own children and young adults.

As much as I’m looking forward to meeting new people in Cape Town and learning about the ways in which their society and their progress is different from ours, I’m just as excited to meet everyone else from the UConn program. I completed the pre-departure course from far away in Spain, and although I read through some of my classmate’s discussion board posts, I never got to experience the exchange of ideas and debates in real time. I’m very excited to have discussions about race and inequality with both people from Cape Town and with my classmates from UConn, especially since it’s been so long since I’ve had people in my life to have those conversations with. South Africa may be more readily thought of as a place with racial tensions and inequalities, but I think that the same could be said about UConn (and about many, many other college campuses in the United States).

This pre-departure class required a lot of attention to the outside world as well as personal reflexion, and even though this should go without saying, it reminded me of how many different parts there are to a culture, to a society and to a history. There are so many different things to be aware of when we’re going to a new place, so I think it’s good not only to be as prepared as possible, but also to be prepared to make mistakes and to embrace the consequences of leaving our comfort zones.