What is gained, in the exchanges of sharing the experiences of difference of lifestyle here, and there…translated…
The sixth graders in town already, researched for a whole month on the subject of Asian countries, the school instructor had invited me to introduce Taiwan to them; other than taking the advantage, to sell the country to them, I'd also introduced to the kids, the differences of the lives of students.
From before when I still lived in Taiwan, I'd gone to her class, to share with the students our lives in the, Netherlands, at the time, the students were really, enthusiastic, they envied how the students in the Netherlands didn't have any, homework assignments, and, that after school, they'd all gone to play with their classmates, or, neighbors, and, even if the students were in the afterschool programs, they didn't have more work to do, but instead, got to, pursue their, individual, hobbies, reading the comics, the handiworks, or, just, play with the group of students who were in the classes.
illustration from UDN.com
This time, before I introduced a different topic, I'd, asked the local children about their own, life experiences, then, I'd, introduced them to how it was in Taiwan, and, through the compare and contrast, it'd, given the students, a real-time experience.
The students felt that it was so cool, riding the scooters to, school, because they'd had to, ride their bicycles, rain or shine, to go to classes every single day. As I'd talked about the homework assignments, a young boy puckered up and started complaining, "We all have three pages of assignments to complete every week, that's too much!", I'd laughed at him, that he didn't know how blessed he was. The instructors in the Netherlands knew, that that way, she wouldn't be stuck, in grading the students' works, and will have the time, for other activities, such as having the students clean up the restrooms, as that, was the tasks, delegated to the students, during, cleaning, period. Because there were the janitors hired for the schools to clean the toilets, and the instructors and the assigned two students were left in charge of, cleaning up the classrooms after use.
They'd also envied that there's the free nutritious meals served at the schools, stated how amazing it was, to have hot meals for lunches every single day, that there were the sweet desserts served after the meals! Wasn't like them, had to pack the cold sandwiches, and the fruits from home.
There were, only, two major exams in the schools in the Netherlands, to not stress the students, out, and there's no announcements prior to the test date, it all relied on what the students had, learned and, absorbed in class previously. And, there's only, the percentiles on the grade sheets, which was from the comparisons of the students of the same age across the country. If a student is behind, then, the parents and the instructors would get into discussion; and, those who performed well don't get rewarded, but instead, they were given the options, to challenge themselves in having a harder set of problems to do in class. So, when I'd mentioned of the sectional exams, that the three highest scorers would get commended, that those who'd bombed on the exams may get punished by the parents when they got home, they were, amazed by this.
Then, I'd shared with them the sights in Taiwan, we all loved nature, we'd gone hiking, climbing a lot, swum in the local creeks, and, as the rice were, harvested from the fields, we'd started making a fire and baked the yams in the autumns. These students in the Netherlands longed for it, because, the Netherlands are flat, with no mountains, so they'd felt that their home was, too, boring to live in, just, the grassy plains, no change, and some of the student even thought, that the Netherlands were, too, ugly!
This group of students had, helped me understood that the life we took to be, natural, is what others find, interesting. In the songs that the students sung to see me off, I'd, exited their class, and, felt, that I was the one, learning, a lesson, today.
And so, this, is how life can be, so different, and, for those who didn't get to live life here, they may envy the life that's here, and, for those of us who live here, we want to, get out of here, because of, the multitude of reason, and, it's not that one place is better than another, it's just, that there are, the pros and cons of each and every place in the world, and we only envy someone else for the life somewhere else, because we hadn't, lived there, yet.
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