In the summer of 2012, I decided to
take a summer school course introducing Translation and Interpretation at the Johannes
Gutenberg University in Germersheim, Germany. I had just graduated from Ohio
State in March of that same year and had no direction with my life. So I
thought to myself, why not see the world while I’m searching? And see the world
I did.
When I arrived at this little town
in Germany, I did not really know what to expect. I had been to Europe before,
but every small city or town is quite different with its own respects. I was
settled into the quaint town of Germersheim. It was a very beautiful town but
rather small as I am used to. Upon arriving there were some problems with my
housing situation so I was eventually placed into a nice little apartment quite
a ways from the town center. This was no problem since they decided I could
rent a bike, granted that I lived the farthest away from the campus. A nice
little set-up after all!
The first day at orientation, we
did a survey of how many different countries students were from. To my amazement
I was the only American there, but there were also; Russians, Greeks, Italians,
the English (England), Irish people, Czechs, Polish people, Ukrainians, Spaniards,
Sweds, and even a Kenyan. I was no doubt pleasantly surprised I was going to be
experiencing so many different cultures in one congregated place.
There were only a few people that
spoken English as their native language so it was a great experience trying to
use my German to communicate with these people from all over the world. My
first realization was that the Italian and Greek cultures are very proud
cultures. The Italians and Greeks would first not interact with each other
because they felt they were better than the other, but by the end of the trip
they seemed to mix quite well together. The Cyrillic speakers were very too the
point when I spoke with them. I also noticed that whoever spoke a Cyrillic language
seemed to adapt better to the German syntax. Why this was? I am not sure of,
but it was noticeable nonetheless. The Spanish speakers were amongst the friendliest
out of all the different cultures, I felt like I could talk to any Spaniard
anytime because of how open they were. The Swedish man was a researcher, just
like I imagined all Swedish people were. All these different people were
smashed together and somewhat-assimilated into the German culture together.
Each culture brought a new breath
of life to my view of the world. We had several weekends to share our own
cultures while learning the traditional and modern German culture. Being able
to connect with people that have such different views as you, really brings me
joy. The power of communication and language is nothing to scoff at. If we
could all learn more about other’s cultures, I believe we could really open up
our way of thinking and progress humanity with a more harmonic approach. Cultural
diversity is an amazing opportunity to learn something about yourself and
someone else.
Even though I started out going to Germany for
translation and interpretation, I ended up getting much more out of it than
just that! The world has a lot to offer if you stop to take a look. Noticing
the beauty of the dissimilarities can sometimes come as a challenge, but if you
take the time to step into another way of thinking, you too, can experience the
tremendous multiplicity of ideas aroused from other cultural views.
Taking a step into a foreign land
may seem like a big risk sometimes, but the experience, good or bad, you gain
from it will forever make an impression on you. Take a walk in someone else’s
shoes for a change. Dream another’s dream for a night. Surround yourself in an
array of new concepts. Becoming sensitive to cultural diversity can affect one’s
entire life. One starts to appreciate how different and similar we all really
are. Each day that we become more culturally sensitive, we become more in tune
with our fellow brothers and sisters of this world. So let’s keep rockin’ out
to that funky beat of omni-cultural acceptance.
