I was sad and disappointed when I heard the news of the strike. Wednesday is the day when I teach most of my classes and meet with many different students and professors to practice English and Portuguese. Although I understand the need for change in the educational buraeracry, there are so many strikes that each time they occur they seem a little less effective. It's also frustrating that when there's a strike it's the students who ultimately lose out.
The strikes always lend themselves to interesting discussions, however, and yesterday was no different. In my morning class, my students wanted to talk about the prevalence of strikes and standstills in the U.S.A. "We don't really deal with strikes too much on a daily basis" I started to say when I quickly realized my obvious error - the fact that my own government is in a state of "shutdown" currently. My students, many of whom were not aware of the U.S. government shutdown, were extremely interested in the messed up American state of affairs. We ended up having a great conversation about the relevant problems of both countries and I think my students walked away feeling a little bit prouder of Brazil and a little less impressed with the U.S. One of the biggest problems here is a feeling of shame and embarrassment of Brazil and an almost godlike reverence for the U.S.A. By talking honestly and openly about some of the major challenges that my country faces encourages more realistic conversations and expectations along with stronger relationships.
Sean and I decided to use the UESC standstill as a creative opportunity to do something different rather than having it be a total wash. We're having English and Portuguese classes at our apartment today and later are having some students over to cook some Brazilian and American food. Now if we could just figure out how to turn the U.S. government "paralisação" into a creative opportunity for something. . .
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