My laboratory

This week marks my 6th month of service at Feng-shan Elementary School.
Already, it's a half year of my life that represents the shaping of my character in the most profound ways.

I've had unprecedented interaction with many different people and personalities. I've come to better understand the issues and problems that beset a small, rural community in terms of education policy, and other social/economic issues. I don't think an opportunity like this happens everyday. Each time I learn something new, whether from success, setback or even grave defeat, I try to remember it and even cherish this feeling of discovery.

Fengshan has been my laboratory for great experiments. My times in Taiwan are much like a clean slate---virtually an unwritten surface. Today, I've written several of my discoveries down. They must be reprocessed at a later date, but they need to be addressed as well.

1) The kids are the mirror to the future. [This may sound cliche, but not so much when the fact is upon you 24/7]
2) Adults are children. Teachers are older children teaching younger ones.
3) Bureaucracy is the instutionalization of our hidden agendas and lack of humanism.
4) Lack of humanism stems from looking into a cracked mirror for too long and blaming the distortion on others.

Principal X reminded me one day while driving me to class: "Just as I am acting out my part as school X's principal, so to are you acting out your role as an alternative service conscript. The way you choose to act is up to you." Thus, I am considering how my role can be evaluated in terms of observations 1) through 4).

Elaborations from the laboratory continue tomorrow.