more barn.
Wednesday, June 13th, 2007“if the teacher teaches it and the student gets it, then the student will be prepared for the future.”
- the above was uttered by one of the teachers i work with at the school where i’m interning. what i find interesting and telling about this remark is the concept of teaching existing even if nothing is learnt. ??
also went to a community centre to find out what free/drop-in services are available to seniors and students alike. found the woman to be very preoccupied with race. asked what our ethnicity was and then mentioned that they had a lot of chinese members. not sure what connection they were trying to make there. this is after my mom has stated that korean is it’s own language and alphabet completely separate from chinese. they also proceeded to suggest activities like reiki (which is japanese! not chinese!) and qi gong to my mom. i don’t understand. it’s not like i find out someone’s french and then try to introduce them to yodelling or scottish dancing … and if you don’t know anything about the cultures, why assume?
later, a friendly elderly gentleman offers me and my mom coffee and when my mom makes a joke about her poor english pronunciation he responds, “well, i’m sure it’s better than my chinese!” again… why make the assumption? or is it really still believed that one can use chinese as a short hand to describe all things east asian (or even asian in general) without offense?
to be fair, upon further reflection, maybe the woman was just a bad listener. my mom repeatedly mentioned that she wasn’t interested in relaxation activities but she just kept pushin’ em on her- reiki, qi gong, meditation, gentle yoga…