Don't Go!

Last week in class, we were discussing the attacks in Turkey and Belgium.  The students, many of whom live pretty sheltered lives, were trying to make sense of the terror attacks.  They had many questions:  Why people are willing to blow themselves up for a cause?  Why Turkey?  Why Belgium?  Are we (the US) next?  Are we safe?  There was a palpable sense of uncertainty amongst my students.

When the students learned that the attacks in Belgium happened at the airport, they couldn't fathom how it was possible given the amount of security that we experience at airports here in the US.  Then I explained that the bombs were detonated in the area before the security checkpoints, which led to a discussion on the belief that many Americans have a false sense of security in spite of the international terror attacks and our own experience with gun violence.

My collaborative teacher, Becky, spoke up and said how the discussion was making her nervous about flying. Then I said, "Think about me!  I am the one flying halfway around the world to the Philippines in June!"  Jake, a senior, spoke up and said, "Don't go!"  I asked him to clarify what he meant and he said if I didn't feel safe, then I shouldn't go on my trip.  I paused and thought for a minute about the advice I was being given by an 18-year-old.  Could it really be as simple as "Don't go?"

While in his eyes, it is that simple, in my eyes, it is so much more complex.  I told him that anytime I travel, I always have a little bit of fear about something happening, but I can't let that fear stop me from traveling!  The types of tragedies experienced by many people around the world on a daily basis are not too dissimilar from the gun violence that happens here in the US.  I discussed the San Bernadino shootings, the Uber driver shootings, and the church shooting in Charleston, SC.  All of the victims in those shootings were just going about their daily routines when they were tragically killed.  Violence does not recognize international borders; it can and does happen here in the US.

So my reply to Jake's "Don't go!" is that  I MUST go!  I must go to learn more and help myself and my students make sense of this world.

"Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, 

and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts.  

Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things 
cannot be acquired 

by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime."

 -Mark Twain