A Reason for Hope

I am in touch with an young woman who just graduated from high school and is involved with a student exchange progam in Brazil for a year. Her email today brought me a lot of hope for the future and I thought it might do the same for all of you. She spent a week traveling with other exchange students from all over the world. Here’s what she said about an event in the middle of the trip:

As we reluctantly returned from our amazing adventure we had probably the best
lunch of the trip. The food was amazing but the conversation was
unforgettable. Although we had had serious conversations before, this was
the one that topped them all. We discussed everything from politics and
voting, abortion and teenage pregnancy, economics, the differences in public
education around the world, racism, gender, cultural differences among
states in the US, gay marriage, poverty and crime, the influence religions
have on government bodies, and probably more that I´m forgetting. I have
never been in a such deep, passionate discussion in all my life. And the
amazing part about it was despite the many different views and beliefs,
everyone listen to each other….no yelling, no “you don´t know what you´re
talking about,” no interrupting, no belittling. Just conversation to voice
your opinion and more importantly to hear what others have to say. I think
that it is so very true….. being an exchange student makes you so much
more open to the ideas and beliefs of others. It is so fascinating to hear
what people have to say who have been brought up so much differently than
you. You get to see a whole different perspective that you never would have
though of before. There is this saying “If former exchange students were
given political power around the world, there would be no wars.” Now of
course when I first herd this I rolled my eyes thinking…yeah right, as if
a year on exchange could do that. But now after being a part of a discussion
with kids from all over the world, I truly believe that this statement holds
at least some truth to it. There was no arrogance, jealousy or resentment
like we see in many debates and meetings between world leaders. It was
listening and voicing opinions for what we believe to be the better good for
the world…not just the country we are from.