In my book Another Place, there’s a chapter titled Typical People. In that chapter, I highlight how other typical foreign students in Berlin spend their time on drinking, expensive coffees, and dress in high-fashion just to impress their peers. I don’t call them my peers because that would imply that I associate myself with them. The VSP has been going on for two weeks now and so far, my experience leads me to believe that there are three main categories of students (not that all students fit in these categories, but many could be comfortably classified in one or more of these three categories):
- Hardworking, go-getting, A+ achievers
- Tim Hortons/Starbucks every day w/ regular outlet shopping trips
- Gamers, sleepers, lack a sense of responsibility
I’m sure there are specific terms for the three types of people I described, but maybe I’m just not smart enough to know, maybe some of the type 1 people could tell me. I have nothing against hardworking people who are trying to get a high grade in an academically challenging environment. You might expect a ‘but’ here, no, no buts. One of my high school Chinese teachers once told me:
“Every student is responsible for their own learning. I teach, you decide how much to take in.” ~ Ms. Li
Be it reading extra articles, asking the right questions, or extending assignments to cover relevant peripheral topics of interest, I do agree that those in type 1 are surely learning a lot more than other students given the same learning environment. Education helps us make sense of the world around us, those in type 1 are far more likely to have a better understanding of the world and can analyse the world more critically.
In general, I don’t have a problem with those in type 3 either as long as they’re not living in the same flat as me. Unfortunately, several guys in my flat do fit into this category; they stay up late gaming and yelling up till 2am invading into my sleeping time. Several guys decided to make a steak one night and they didn’t bother washing up until I told them to clean up the following night because the entire flat stank of cow oils. There are still some dirty cups from two nights ago that are sitting on the table unwashed. Some of them also seem to be unable to aim properly at the toilet, if you miss, please clean up.
In class, students from type 3 express some of the most disrespectful behavior in class. They eat hot breakfast in class and create noise with the ruffling of paper bags. Then, when they have fed themselves they fall asleep in the back row. I have no problem with eating in class, just don’t eat something that emits an odor and take food out of the paper bag to keep quiet. If the professor’s putting their back into teaching, it’s the student’s duty to put their back into learning. If you’re going to sleep you might as well not come to class – don’t disrespect others effort and right to learn free of distraction and expect to be respected by other people.
A few of my peers (and only very few of them) don’t fit in any of the three categories and I’m honored to have them as friends. While we were cooking together we discussed how it is a waste of an excellent opportunity abroad if you drink Tim Hortons coffee (without trying Iced Capp or Timbits) and plan trips to the outlet malls instead of learning to cook local recipes and planning trips to learn more about indigenous culture, i.e. people in type 2. I feel this is point is particularly valid for students taking an anthropology course on Musqueam land.
We travel not only to have fun, but also to learn about other people’s way of life. In learning from others we do it both out of our curiosity and out of respect for those that host us on their lands. I’m not trying to be self-righteous, respect for a local nation should be shown, and when someone studies anthropology in UBC doesn’t show the effort to learn about indigenous culture, it shows a certain level of ignorance. I might do my groceries at Walmart, but I also support local cultures by buying from First Nations arts stores and participating in discussions in public libraries to learn about residential schools.
My DREAMWALL, pictures of trips (Squamish, Sweden, Malaysia, Poland) that I loved to inspire me to continue exploring the world, maps of Vancouver, a class timetable, dreamcatcher made by First Nations artists, and other interesting flyers/posters.
