Topic #75: What’s the biggest lesson you learned so far this year?
When I got an email from our former exchange student, a girl who’d lived with us for a year, asking if she and her husband could evacuate from Tokyo to our house, I learned our world is very small. I learned that the ties that wrap around the earth, from exchange students to host families to other students, are a web of interconnectivity. The purpose of youth exchange is to forge connections around the world. That purpose is unfolding all over the world as millions of North Americans who’ve hosted Japanese students worry about ‘their kids’ half a world away.
I’m glad we can do something concrete to help amid this tragedy. It is awesome that through youth exchange, we really can help change the world. Let us be thankful for our connections around the world and the opportunities they provide for us to improve our planet.
Shawn L. Bird 