Back in Business...I hope

It has been over two years since my last post, an announcement that Cori and I would not be returning to Hungary to teach. However, there is now a chance that we will. Or, at least we may travel somewhere abroad to teach.

Last week I completed my application to the Fulbright Teacher Exchange Program. As a teacher of world history and economics I may be limited by the number of possible exchanges, but Cori and I have our collective fingers crossed.

I should find out sometime in November if I have been selected for an interview. The interviews normally take place in December. Then, if approved for an exchange, I would be notified sometime around February. At that point I would have the right to accept or decline the placement. If accepted, Cori and I would move abroad for the 2009-2010 school year!

My top three country choices (there are only 5 countries that are accepting social studies teachers) are 1. Czech Republic, 2. Hungary, and 3. Ghana. Also possible are Switzerland (high cost of living) and the United Kingdom (cost of living and lacking the cultural complexities we're looking for). Two other countries looking for teachers, but not of the social studies variety, that I wish I could go to are India and Turkey. Oh well, I'd probably settle for any of the five listed above.

The program requires that an applicant be in at least his third year of teaching at his current institution, which I am. If approved, I would essentially trade places with a foreign teacher who would teach my classes at Germantown. My principal and district administrator are fully supportive of this opportunity! In fact, my administrator is a former Fulbright teacher himself, having participated in an exchange to Romania a few years ago.

The application was fairly extensive, with a personal essay being the most daunting component. Here's what I ended up writing. I hope they like it!

Instructions:

On no more than two additional pages, please write one essay addressing both A and B below:

A. Provide a narrative picture of yourself. The essay should deal with your personal history, focusing on influences on your intellectual development, the educational and cultural opportunities (or lack of them) to which you have been exposed, and the ways in which these experiences have affected you. Also include your special interests and abilities.

B. Describe your future career goals and plans, especially ways you plan to use your experience abroad in your professional work in this country and to enhance international education in your school/college and community.

During an era of rapid economic, political, and technological globalization, the need for cross-cultural education, tolerance and, in the end, acceptance, could not be more pressing. Nearly 90 years ago, H.G. Wells authored The Outline of History, in which he insightfully noted,

The weaving of mankind into one community does not imply the creation of a homogeneous community, but rather the reverse; The community to which we may be moving will be more mixed (which does not necessarily mean more interbred), more various and more interesting than any existing community. Communities all to one pattern, like boxes of toy soldiers, are things of the past rather than the future.

More recently, we have famously been told that “The World Is Flat.” This characterization may be apt. However, the world’s citizens surely do not appear to be equipped to contend with its natural consequence: that cultures will increasingly be pressed into challenging and potentially contentious encounters with each other. The potential outcomes of this situation present a stark contrast: peaceful coexistence, or mass conflict risking possible extinction. I believe education will be the difference-maker.

My own educational experience has motivated me to change the way we teach. I had been labeled an “underachiever” by my teachers and parents. My natural intellect was offset by poor academic performance. I muddled through high school, unsure of the relevance of what was being taught. My parents urged, “Work hard and earn good grades so you can attend a good college.”

“But, to what end?” I often wondered. “To get a job that pays well?” Though satisfying to many, this notion failed to motivate me. School seemed unfulfilling at best, irrelevant at worst.

Midway through my freshman year of college I had an “awakening” of sorts. For weeks I had considered dropping out. I had only enrolled in college out of a sense of duty, to fulfill the expectations of those around me. I lacked direction and purpose. Desperate for answers I started examining the lives of other students. It was a group of music majors that caught my attention. These students spent their free time on nights and weekends enjoying the subject they were working so hard to master during the day. They were studying something they loved to do! My mind started racing. In a matter of days I met with my advisor and changed my major from mathematics to geography and economics, topics that had fascinated me since childhood. As a young boy I would sneak a flashlight under the covers late at night, not to read comic books or Sports Illustrated, but to “read” the world atlas. I would trace the rivers and railroads from place to place. I sailed along the Nile, rode trains across Siberia, journeyed deep into the rainforests of Brazil, and peeked behind the Iron Curtain. A decade later, with childlike wonder, I finally “owned” my education. I was finally going to school because I wanted to learn.

Fifteen years have passed since then. That time has been marked by moments of realization, many inspired by considering the world from an alternate perspective.

“True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize how little we understand about life, ourselves, and the world around us”

- Socrates

In 2005 while enrolled in school to earn a teaching license, an advisor mentioned the opportunity to student teach in one of two foreign countries: Costa Rica and Hungary. Costa Rica in springtime would be beautiful, but Hungary captured my imagination. My father’s family emigrated from Russia in the early 20^th century and I had always been interested in the Soviet Bloc. A few emails and one lovingly selfless decision by my wife later, I was heading somewhere I hadn’t been since those late nights under the covers with a flashlight.

A teacher met me at the airport in Budapest and drove me to Szolnok, a mid-sized city located about 100 kilometers from the capital. Suffering from jet lag and culture shock, I had little to say. A short time later, Juliana dropped me off at my new home: a communist-era block flat. I was alone, very alone. Loneliness and fear washed over me. I did not speak the language. I had no phone or Internet. I had no real idea where I was. I felt completely vulnerable.

Shortly, I began to notice countless tiny details. Hungary smelled different. The aluminum foil was really thin. People drank pear juice. Tables did not carry salt and pepper shakers, rather salt and paprika shakers. Hungary was certainly different, but with each new experience, I learned to cope, adapt, and embrace. I worked hard to learn Hungarian words and phrases. The people were so appreciative when they heard an American make an effort to speak their unique language. They would smile and warmed to me. I learned to communicate using hand gestures, pictures, and facial expressions. Sometimes, when the message couldn’t be transmitted, I learned something much more important: patience and humility. Never again would I frustratingly sigh when a non-English speaker in line ahead of me struggled to find correct change. I was quickly becoming comfortable living in a foreign land.

Among my goals while in Hungary was to explore people’s views on international issues. No one made a greater impact on me than Attila. A 26-year-old public defender with university degrees in law, economics, and public policy, Attila was clearly well educated and intelligent. He had spent a year attending high school in California, which he enjoyed, but he said the school was not very challenging and the students seemed immature to him. But when I asked him if he hoped to return to the United States one day work, his response staggered me.

“No," he stated, "I would never lend my intellectual capabilities to a nation with a foreign policy such as yours."

I was too stunned to be offended. Attila explained why he felt this way: he viewed the American government as conceited, brash, and reckless. He described the United States as a global empire set on economic and military expansion. Although, he was quick to note, he really appreciated all the American people he had met. Naiveté can only begin to describe how I felt after our conversation. This was a perspective with which I was vaguely familiar, but one that had been roundly demonized by the American pundits whom I read. In the following weeks, I spoke with other Hungarians, along with Slovenes, Slovaks, and Czechs. Nearly all shared Attila’s opinion: The American people seemed very generous and friendly, but their government had become a global bully.

Socrates was speaking to me.

"When you don't understand you will fear and when you fear you will destroy."

- Chief Dan George

During my second year teaching World History at Germantown High School, I asked a student if she would speak to my class. She was one of two hijab-wearing Muslim students in the school. In fact, she was one of only a small handful of Muslim students in the school. My class was studying the origins of Islam and had been asking many cultural questions that I couldn’t answer. Rabia agreed to join us, though on the day of the talk she was very nervous. She explained the pillars of Islam, the tradition of the hijab, and her experience moving to the United States from Pakistan as a little girl. She described how scared she felt on 9/11: for her country, America, and for her people, Muslims. I could tell the students had many questions, but were afraid to ask. After a few minutes everyone started to open up. Students began to ask about dating, playing sports, wearing shorts, and listening to music. To the student’s surprise, Rabia’s answers were quite like any other teenager’s might have been: She liked soccer, she loved talking on the phone, she had a ton of songs on her i-pod, and she even laughed when a student asked if her parents had already pick out a husband for her.

The next day my students told me it was one of the greatest experiences they had ever had in school. Many of the girls said they thought Rabia was “cool” and that they wished they had talked to her sooner. Everyone seemed surprised she was so “normal.”

Chief Dan George’s words speak volumes about the desparate need for meaningful, authentic, cross-cultural education in this “flattened” world.

In recent months I have talked with my administration about creating an international travel course that would allow students to explore the effects of more than four decades of communism on Central and Eastern European culture and perspective. At the same time I expressed my interest in applying for a Fulbright Teaching Exchange grant. They were excited about both. I believe spending a full year teaching in Central Europe will afford me the opportunity to build relationships and lay a foundation necessary to create a meaningful, authentic, cross-cultural opportunity for American students to travel abroad in the years to come, with the goal of providing them with the same access to unique perspectives that I have been so fortunate to experience.

A change of plans but a bright tomorrow

My first six weeks back in the United States have been hectic. Two weddings; three weekends in Chicago; a trip to Minneapolis; two trips to Crandon, WI; and what seems like a ton of catch-up work both around the house and to complete my teaching certification.

Add to that a sudden change of plans.

Cori and I will not be returning to Hungary this fall. However, I fully intend to enroll in a teacher exchange program within the next five years. I have recently accepted a position teaching history and working with at-risk students at Germentown High School. I'm excited about the opportunity to begin working "for real" after six month of student teaching and a year of education classes. We will likely sell our house and move somewhere north of Milwaukee.

In the coming weeks I will continue working to compile a formal pictoral presentation on my time in Hungary, and plan to invite friends, family and the community to a public showing. Stay tuned for details, or email me if you wish to be notified when a date and place are set.

Until then, viszlat, szia and hello!

Slovenia. For real.

(Due to a series of blogger.com failures, pictures associated with this post can be accessed by following the various links included)

When you travel, travel through the back door. That's the Rick Steves philosophy.

Rick is the author of a series of travel guides, and host of a PBS travel show. During my three months in Eastern Europe, my weekend journeys have depended on the contents of his "Best of Eastern Europe 2005." The fact that it's a year old means the prices have undoubtedly gone up and a couple restaurants have closed their doors, but by and large, the information is spot on. It was good enough, in fact, that I purchased "Best of Eastern Europe 2006" from amazon.com and had it shipped to my dad a few weeks before he flew across the Atlantic to visit.

This post isn't a Rick Steves advertisement, but his philosophy of leaving the beaten travel path enough to experience true local culture is one I have adopted. In fact, as I walked the streets of Prague, Budapest, Vienna, Ljubljana, Piran and Eger, I found myself feeling sad for the throngs of tourists sitting at the overpriced, Westernized, streetside cafes and restaurants along Vaci Utca and similar thoroughfares eating from the "Tourist Menus."

So, it was this philosophy that led Cori, my dad and me to the Deluk home in rural, southern Slovenia.

It was sweltering in Slovenia. The three of us sat down for lunch last Friday in 35 degree heat (that's 95 to you and me). I know it was 35 because Mario told me.

Mario speaks no English, but we communicated using a combination of German, Italian, Slovene, and a heavy dose of body language. We ate in the backyard of Mario Deluk's vineyard, about 10 kilometers from nowhere, which is another 30 minutes from Piran, the now-well known (to this blog's readers) Slovenian Mediterranean coastal village. The only way we discovered Mario's eatery was because the lone English speaker at another winery told us about it. We had stopped at that winery after spotting some inviting road signs. But they were closed, preparing for a large party that evening. So we took the rental and drove 3 or 4 kilometers down the narrow gravel road "to the first house on the right after the asphalt road that goes up the hill. It doesn't look nice, but you'll get a lot of food for almost nothing."

As promised.

When we arrived (And there's absolutely nothing marking this location as a restaurant...not a sign, an awning or a parking lot) two heavy set women were working in a kitchen that would have made satan sweat. After a couple mintes of awkward miscommunication (no one there spoke any English, although German or Italian would have helped) I was able to gesture "eat" and we were told with a smile to sit. No other diners were there, only a little girl in a swimsuit who I presume was a grand daughter. The girl would later get in trouble because the dog she was supposed to be watching climbed onto a table and pulled a large cut of pork from a heaping plate of meat. Thankfully this was her table, not ours; But, we all laughed. That is until "Mama" came out of the house. Mama, we later learned, is Mario's 84 year old mother. When we told the shirtless Mario, "no one takes any 'guff' from Mama," by pounding our fist on the table, he laughed from his belly and poured himself more wine.

Shortly later, my dad turned to us and asked, "how will we tell them what we want to eat?" I told him, "I think we're going to eat whatever they bring out." First we got soup. "Soopa Istria" as Mario called it. This thick, hearty soup included large chunks of Slovenian bacon (that means the rind was too touch to chew through. While tasty, you had to swallow it somewhat whole), and plenty of carrots, beans, garlic and potato.

When we each finished our bowls (Cori even ate everything...except the bacon), we all agreed we were full. But, we couldn't stop the waves of food Marianna (Mario's wife) kept bringing from the kitchen. Next was home made gnocchi with large chunks of beef. The gnocchi was Cori's favorite, and it were great. Later on, we watched as Marianna made more gnocchi in the kitchen for a 60th birthday party that they were hosting that night.

During the meal Mario told us we were 15 meters from Croatia. Pointing to his vinyard he said "Hrvatska," the Croatian word for Croatia. Marianna then made a swimming-like motionand we figured Croatia was on the other side of the small creek running behind the house. My dad jokingly asked if Mario had ever shot at Croatian soldier. I was momentarily uneasy with the comment, but Mario releaved my concerns with a hearty laugh, then added to my releif and made me laugh when he mimiked shooting a machine gun while shouting "Kalashnikov," the inventer of the "AK-47," the famous Russian military rifle. Aah, the fun you can have with heat, wine and the inability to speak a common language.

The next plate was piled on with various grilled meats: cased and uncased sausage, veal, pork and another meat which was good and could have been lamb or mutton but we're never really sure. Mario also gave us salad greens with fresh tomotoes and olive oil.

All the while Mario was pouring us wine. His wine. He makes 4500 liters or red and 12000 liters of white a year. He started by bringing us a platter with three glasses or white and three of red, unsure of which we wanted, and unable to communicate the point. Cori drank the whites, my dad and I had the reds, and within minutes Mario was up from the table and back again carrying a carafe of red and a glass for himself. He joined us at the table and the "conversation" continued.

Later, he took us into his wine cellar and poured us glasses straight from the vats. At this point there was all sorts of laughing, picture taking, hand shaking, hugging and cheek kissing. My dad asked if he could buy a couple bottles, so Mario left before returning with two, one-liter, plastic water bottles, filled 'em up, and screwed on the caps.

Wine tasting Slovenian style.

As we sat in the car looking at the map trying to figure out where we were and how to get back to nowhere so we could eventually return to Piran, Mario appeared with a single, freshly picked daisy for Cori.

The perfect ending.

The whole afternoon (and it was a whole afternoon, about 3 hours), including the two bottles of carryout wine, the 1, 2 or 3 bottles that we must have drank at the vinyard, the soup, the salad, the gnocchi, the piles of meat, the glasses fresh from the vats, the plate of sweets, the once in a lifetime cultural experience, and the fresh daisy cost ... about $50.

Part of me hopes to return one day, but I don't think I will. I don't want to risk losing these perfect memories.

Economic woes

I have many anecdotes that highlight the inherent difficulties (cultural, infrastructure-based, and bureoucratic) Hungary will have to overcome before its economy is able to get onto the right track. Over the coming months I'll share some of them here. Here's a news report that covers
the result of these difficulties as Hungary teeters on the brink of economic meltdown.

It's not a pretty picture.

We're coming to America

10 days of barnstorming around Eastern Europe have come to a close and now we say goodbye to Hungary.

It's 7:06 AM. Cori, my dad and I are in Szolnok, all packed up, waiting for a friend to arrive to take us to the train station. From there we will take a train to Kobanya-Kispest on the edge of Budapest. There we will board a bus for Ferihegy airport where Cori will split from my dad and me. Cori's flights take her through Amsterdam and London to Chicago, while we fly direct to New York before heading to the windy city. Despite this, we depart 5 minutes apart, and arrive within a half hour of each other. Cori and I will take a Greyhound bus to Madison where he parents will pick us up. My dad will spend the night at nat's house before driving home in the morning.

We'll see you soon.