Keep your eyes on the stars, and your feet on the ground.’
Theodore Roosevelt (1858 – 1919),
26th US President (1901 -1 909).
Roosevelt has captured our learning experiences so succinctly during these past 10 days. We can dream, imagine, visualize, recreate new landscapes and relive experiences, as if we are present in that harsh environment, lived there in that period of time, and engaged with all our five senses in those special moments. We must never underestimate the potential and power for possibilities that lies in the human mind, the most fundamental tool we have at hand for learning deeply and richly. It is only through the mind that we are able to get glimpses into the past, to live the lives of people worlds apart and in different realms of time from us.
On this journey, we have walked the hallways of the House of Seven Gables, sat on the pathway outside and saw, felt, smelt and touched the falling autumn leaves… it was amazing!
We have treaded the footprints of the early pioneers, and through their eyes, saw the many challenges that they were faced with when settling down in New England. Salem in New England was beautiful and is not all that doom and gloom, but having endured the cold winds and rain there ourselves, we can understand why neighbours behaved the way they did in Arthur Miller’s ‘The Crucible’ and resorted to blaming others for practising witchcraft; at the very least, it ensured their own survival.
We have dreamt of being a Harvard, MIT or Columbia scholar, our feet on the ground but with dreams and hopes high up in the air. In all the different places we went to and through the various learning activities, we have imagined our lives differently…We feel and empathize with Raoul’s deep grief and anguish when Christine leaves him in ‘The Phantom of the Opera’, we feel Ben Stiller’s exhilaration as he runs around when the characters of the Natural History Museum come alive in ‘The Night at the Museum’.
But most importantly, this journey has shown the resilience of the human mind and spirit and its innate ability to overcome setbacks and still venture forth to learn. When faced with Hurricane Sandy’s arrival and her disastrous aftermath, our minds constantly being assaulted by the visual images we see on the TV in the hotel, and what we hear, what did we choose to do? With our feet planted on the ground, we chose to compile collages, draw images and symbols, sketch scenes and write poems and stories based on all our sensorial experiences and observations of what was unfolding before us. And the human mind tells you that life goes on, no matter what … The lessons are endless, we only need search for the gems behind them.
We sincerely hope you have learnt as much as we have from this journey. Thank you for being our travel companions!
Love,
TEAM USA 2012
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