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Meet Emerson: A Tufts 1+4 Engineering Student
Alumni Post: Olive is the New Me
by Olive, Tufts 1+4 Participant
“Hi Gongga! This is … from the Tufts elections commission. I just wanted to say CONGRATULATIONS! You have a seat on the Senate class of 2020.” I was sitting at Tisch, just got kicked out from the reading room and getting ready to enter again when I saw this message. I could not believe what I just read it, because this seemed so surreal that I just won the election. It was a mixture of feelings that suddenly overwhelmed me. I wanted to tell all my friends who supported me through this race that I’m thankful for their support. I also just wanted to run around and express my joy.
I have always wanted to run for the student government since I arrived in the U.S. because that was something I always had done in China. I stopped doing it here, because I suddenly felt insecure about my skills and unconfident about myself in social places due to my “limited English.” I was always scared of speaking out for what I wanted because I didn’t want my poor accent to betray my “Asian American Identity.” It was easier to stay silent than to speak somehow. I know now that this way of life is not what I’m looking for.
It became better for me when my English improved closer to my peers’ level, enabling me to speak my opinions or ask the questions that I have in my mind. I became more open toward running for student government. However, my introverted personality was a really big barrier because high school elections were more like popularity contests. I hated talking to people about myself, because I was afraid I was not good enough. I never had the courage to tell my high school classmates that I wanted to run for student government.
Participating in Tufts 1+4 opened myself onto a new level – I started to challenge myself, from little things to bigger projects. I enjoyed traveling alone even when it meant getting lost 10 times a day, and asking an average 20 people for help. There were ups and downs when I traveled alone. I remember how I was alone on New Year’s Eve and walked hours and hours when nothing was open, in the popular city Seville that was famous for its warm attitude toward people; I remember how I ran 17 miles straight along beaches in Malaga on my birthday; I remember how I missed my plane to Berlin and had to take a 13 hour bus from Brussels to Berlin on Christmas’ Eve; I remember hiking the tallest mountain El Teide in Spain.
The idea of running for Tufts student government grew in my head over my gap year, because I started to realize how short and fast time goes. I wanted to take advantage of my time at Tufts, and to challenge myself. I started to tell my close friends that I made in 1+4, and my BLAST friends that I met at Tufts during the summer, that I’m going to run for the senate. I was scared, nervous and super shy about running, and I was not sure how to open the topic to my friends. I worried that they would laugh at me, because of how inexperienced I am. Their reactions were super supportive and gave me the courage to try.
Creating the poster for my campaign was also like creating a new identity for me, because I used “Olive” instead of “Gongga”. Many people often question me why I named myself as “Olive.” Sometimes I would just joke “because I loved to eat olives when I was in Spain.” This was partially true, but I also wanted to give myself a new identity before coming to Tufts. I wanted Olive to be the person that I became in Spain – a brave girl who was willing to try anything, who had a spontaneous personality and was willing to live life in the moment, an open minded girl who was outgoing and made friends all over the world. I let the old serious Gongga go, and I decided to let the internal Olive shine.
I remembered the day when I almost decided to give up on running because I saw how serious and prepared people were about their campaigns on Facebook. All those professional pages with hundreds of likes and details about their campaign ideas made me just want to quit ASAP. However, I still decided to make a page and even a campaign video. The video was a success, everyone laughed at how “funny”, and “genuine” it was. I think the video showed people that I really want to share my love and passion toward the senate.
Two days before election day, and I had to attend the candidate campaign forum. I was so nervous about the forum, I did not know how to present my platforms and introduce myself to all the students. However, finishing up the forum, when students walked up to me telling me how funny and cute I was, it made me feel relaxed. It also encouraged me that maybe I do have a shot, maybe college is different from high school, and I should bring the Olive attitude to college. I should give myself a new chance and try with enthusiasm.
One day before election day, I started to tell more friends, random people who were freshman, people I met in the gym and cafeteria about me running for the senate. I started to act more naturally, and felt more confident about my race. I even showed my campaign video in my English class.
This is the end of the third week of college. I’m still confused and occasionally feel unmotivated. However, now I have an obligation at Tufts – I have to work hard so the students who voted will not have a reason to regret their decision. Winning this election is not like a happy ending for my time at Tufts; it is more like a tough beginning. I believe that I am and will be ready. I will make Tufts my home and begin a new future here.
How Not to Miss Nicaragua: A Short Guide
by Isabel, Tufts 1+4 Participant
Don’t be surprised by all of the different smells. The pine and grass and carpet instead of dust and mango and the cleaning fluid everyone used.
When you hear the sound of a lawnmower don’t mistake it for the fumigation that happened regularly in León.
Try not to die of hypothermia in the 70 (or 80… or 90) degree weather. And don’t talk about how cold you are. Just be glad you’re not sweating out of your clothes.
When you walk down an empty street don’t remember how in León an empty street meant it was probably raining. Or like 2 in the morning or something. Don’t think about all the street vendors and school children and abuelos you would see on your walk to the bus station. Don’t long for that extra human factor added to the landscape that made it so much more interesting and vibrant.
Don’t speak in Spanish to strangers. Also try and remember that strangers who overhear your conversations in English can now understand you.
When you put your laundry in the washer don’t think about the lavendero where you washed your clothes for nine months. Don’t remember the clothes lines loaded with colorful shirts waving in the breeze, and how you could tell who was doing the washing by the way it sounded.
When your mom wants you to try on some new earrings try not to overreact, refusing because the earrings you have in now are from Nicaragua and you’ll never take them out because that would mean you had moved on. Try on the new earrings. Your gap year experience is more than just a pair of jewelry.
Don’t listen to all the Spanish songs you love and cry because they remind you of how your host family always had music on, of how they used to sing karaoke, of how they would sing and dance.
Don’t think about all the Nicaraguan food you won’t have anymore – the gallo pinto, the nacatamales, the repocheta and cuajada and pithaya and sopa Indio Viejo. Don’t think about Sunday mornings in the kitchen with your family, or squeezing oranges for juice at work. Do remember all those times you longed for American food and appreciate it now that you have it.
Don’t let the deafening silence keep you from falling asleep. And don’t strain your ears for the sounds of reggaeton, the neighbors baby, the dog down the street, or your family doing the washing, all of which were simply a part of your life not too long ago.
But mostly, ignore all the dont’s on this list (except for maybe the Spanish one. That’s kind of important). Do them anyways. Miss Nicaragua. Miss it with all your heart. Talk about it till your friends are tired of hearing about it. Then talk about it some more. Cry. Sob. As much and long as you need. Don’t be afraid of that horrible lonely aching feeling – that just means that what you experienced was real. And don’t, don’t, don’t ever let anyone tell you to get over it. It will get better – maybe not soon but someday. So until then look at all your pictures. Remember and try to write down the best stories. Laugh. Cry. Take some deep breaths. And take it one day at a time. Or one hour. Or ten seconds.
Hygge+Growing Pains= Height
by Madeline, Tufts 1+4 Participant
This jacket is my bear. My bear was bought for 16 euro on a sunny Sunday morning to the music of the bustling Rastro market. The Rastro is a flea market where everything from hammers to artisan pottery to bear jackets are sold. Every Sunday in Madrid, the streets of Tirso de Molina and La Latina are filled with Europe’s finest strolling up and down the crowded calles. You can find anything your heart desires for a relatively reasonable price. But back to my bear.
Madrid’s city symbol is a bear leaning up against a tree because Madrid used to have tons of bears roaming around its fields and forests. Other than the enormous statue in the center of the city that everyone uses as a meeting spot before going out, you’d never really know to care. For me, after I brought my new jacket home to Calle Los Mesejo, my roommates immediately began calling it the bear. It definitely had something to do with the fact that it is absolutely giant, fuzzy, and black. For me, it symbolizes my back and forth love affair with Madrid. When I am wearing my bear I am the warmest and coziest I can be. There’s a word in Danish, hygge, that goes far beyond our definition of cozy. It’s cozy X10. That’s how bear makes me feel. But, that is not always how Madrid has made feel. There have been many days throughout the year where I have longed for the warmth of my bed in Buffalo- the comfort of my childhood home and family. Madrid was foreign. My friends weren’t here. I only half understood the language. Work in the foster home challenged me every day. I felt far, far away from hygge. But then I would realize, that is the challenge of growing.
Do you remember laying in bed when you were little suffering from evil growing pains? The aching and the soreness that seemed like it would never ever end. But then one day, you’d look in the mirror and think… wow, maybe I have gotten a little taller. Or grandma would measure you against the growth chart and there would be a huge gap from your last spurt. Right now, I am looking in the mirror with my life measuring me, and I cannot help but see that I really have grown. It’s all the obvious things… I’m more confident. I can speak with much more fluency in Spanish. I feel needed and useful at work. I can travel Europe with ease. I maneuver my way around an enormous city all alone. I went from high school SAT prep to Europe adapted, adult social work in real time. At the beginning, they asked us how we wanted to change and grow from this year. My BS answer was always “I want to be fluent in Spanish.” I didn’t know what to say because I just wanted to experience it without a plan. Traveling as much as I did had a huge impact on my growth. Mostly, however, it was the social situations in Madrid and the work with the girls that gave me growing pains and, in turn, the height.
Moving to a new country, making friends and adapting to a completely new work environment were crucial but hard. For both of these challenges, I was incredibly fortunate to have my bear, but mostly Eva, the seven year old girl in the foster home. Because of scheduling, she is the one I tend to spend the most time with. Before this September, she had never been to school, the doctors, or the dentist. Her father passed away from an overdose in February 2015, and she was left an orphan because no one knows where her mother is. She didn’t know how to read. She’d never done a math problem. She was a seven year old four year old. This year, Eva has become my best friend. We have both grown so much this year, and we’ve been able to do it together. We learned to read in Spanish together. When I teach her something, she teaches me something. We love dancing around to flamenco music and drawing princesses. We can talk about almost anything and we love to go on the swings. She has brought out my inner kid every single day while still shocking me with her natural maturity and sassy intellect. She is soo bright, hilarious and innocently pure. She made my transition through my growing pains bearable on the days that I really struggled. And I think I helped make her transition into living in a foster home and education a bit smoother. I am so lucky to have made a best friend as beautifully as I have with Eva.
Leaving Spain in two and a half weeks doesn’t seem real. I am going to miss Eva and all of the girls so so much. I am going to miss being hygge in my apartment with my roommates who are now my family. I am going to miss everything about Madrid and yet am so incredibly thankful for this experience. And even though the growing pains hurt like hell some days, I have a lot of height to show for it. I am so lucky to have spent time in this city, in my bear.
El Fin
by Gongga, Tufts 1+4 Participant
It’s May, the month when I’m supposed to go home, even though it feels like I don’t have a very vivid concept of where home is anymore. I don’t know if I should consider Tibet my home, where all my family’s from, or Chengdu, the place where I spent most of my childhood. Maybe it was New York, where I changed under massive cultural shock, or Somerville, where I spent three years of high school and am about to spend my college years. In some ways, every single one of those places were home to me, yet none of them really stands out as strongly anymore as Madrid does – the one place where I felt the happiest, the most comfortable and have experienced the most growth.
I don’t want to go back home. I hate saying goodbye, I don’t want to have to change lifestyles all over again. I’ve never been good at saying goodbye, and never have made strong attachments with loved ones, because I’ve always had to move so often in my life. That made me become a little closed off from others so I never would get hurt. But now I want to experience everything as much as I can, to live, not to regret having missed out.
This is why I chose 1+4: to once again change my current concept of life, to not just feel comfortable where I am, but to challenge myself to do something I’d only ever thought about, but never had the courage to do. Madrid is the place where for the first time I felt free, independent and alive. I did so many things that I never felt capable of doing. I experienced such a diversity of culture in my year abroad in Europe that I’d never encountered when I was in the U.S. It is true that the U.S. is the melting pot of cultural diversity, but the difference for me between the U.S. and Europe is that I was “stuck” with a similar group of people in the U.S. who resembled me, like Asian students or even just high school students. This was one of the reasons why I loved to volunteer in high school, so that I could have an opportunity to meet people outside of my comfort zone.
I loved my travels alone in Europe which at the beginning surprised many of my peers. I’m no longer that shy Asian girl who only cares about her grades; I’m no longer that quiet Asian girl who only speaks out loud in class, but not to her peers; I’m no longer that hesitant Asian girl who only had ideas in her mind yet never really tried to make them happen. Traveling in Europe gave me the opportunity to meet so many different kinds of people from a variety of backgrounds and ages. I learned so many things from them that I would never have learned in school. I gained so much more than I could ever have imagined in this gap year. I have a clearer mind set about the future that I want to have. I feel more motivated to work even harder to achieve what I want in life. I realized that life is for living now and not for worrying about things that might happen. I also gained a family, my Los Mesejo family and my 1+4 family. The three Spain Fellows and me are now just like family. I feel comfortable enough with them that I can just run into them casually and give them a big kiss on the cheek when I see them and share with them about my work and my travels. Though I only spent one short week with the other Fellows, even then, we grew so close as a group, and the bond that we had is even stronger now because we all went through this transformative period in our lives together in different countries.
Lastly, I just want to say thank you to all the teachers, the mentors, and counselor in Somerville High School. I don’t think I would be who I am today without their help. Their encouragement, understanding and passion for teaching helped me transition well from New York to Somerville. Two cities that are so different in terms of size and culture. I also want to say thank you to Jessye and Mindy for making this program possible. To thank them for always being there to support us in good and bad times, and for giving me this opportunity to do something that I believe is the best decision that I made so far in my life.
Al final es un nuevo comienzo, the end is a new beginning. My ending in Madrid is my beginning in Boston. I’m glad that I started this journey here, and now, forever in my heart, Madrid will always be waiting for me to come back home.
Semana Santa in Nicaragua
by Isabel, Tufts 1+4 Participant
My Semana Santa was split between some Caribbean islands and León. The one a tranquil blue and green paradise, the other a vibrant colorful city, bursting with culture and traditions.
I spent five days in the Corn Islands with five other volunteers, from Saturday to Wednesday, although the first and last days were taken up with travel, which looked something like this: Taxi to the bus station in León (20 cordobas) bus to Managua (54 cordobas, make sure you tell the driver to let you off at UCA, because that’s not the last stop), taxi to the airport (shouldn’t be more than 100 cords), flight to Big Corn Island ($197 round trip), taxi to the docks (20 cords), panga to little corn ($6), and finally a short walk to the hostel. We stayed at The Green House, a nice little hostel close to everything. When we had revived somewhat we went out to dinner and thus began our Caribbean adventure. The next few days were a whirlwind of relaxation. A contradiction in terms, but an accurate description. We hiked around the tiny island, swam in the clear blue tropical water, went snorkeling, and drank and ate everything coconut. We also got very thoroughly sunburnt, despite applying what felt like gallons of sunscreen, but it was worth it.
I also got to experience a little bit of the backpacker life – cooking my own food, completely creating my own schedule – and it was nice. But definitely takes some getting used to. Something else that took getting used to was the English/Spanish dilemma. Most islanders are bilingual, and some actually prefer English, it being their first language. If I was spoken to I would respond in the same language, but when initiating a conversation I never knew which language to choose. Often I would try Spanish, only to get a response in English. But between the two we all managed to cobble together an understanding. The whole trip was an amazing experience, filled with friends and laughter, and, like all good vacations, it felt far too short.
If you go:
• Get coconut bread from Esther’s – the sign saying best coconut bread on the island doesn’t lie.
• Electricity only works between 1pm and 6 am, so get internet things done then.
• Make the hike to Yamaya beach – the little slice of paradise connected to the $400 a night hotel. Don’t worry, it’s free.
But what I came back to was amazing in its own way. Semana Santa in León is full of processions. Long events where people walk the streets carrying ‘floats’ with depictions of Jesus or the Virgin Mary, and are accompanied by a very somber band. These processions can last for hours, and in my opinion are best witnessed as they pass by rather than as an active participant. The main event, however, are the sawdust carpets – intricate drawings on the streets made entirely of colored sawdust. While you can find the carpets on different streets every day of the week, the biggest turnout is on Friday, and it just so happens to be in my neighborhood! I took a walk around with the Tufts fellows first during the day while the carpets were still being constructed. We got to see the amazing intricate work in action. I was amazed at how detailed some of the carpets were. And so many colors! Later in the evening I went with my family, by which time all the carpets were finished. It felt like a carnival – half of León must have come out to witness the spectacle. I was surrounded by people talking and laughing, the smell of cotton candy or soda, and the brilliant sawdust carpets drawing everyone’s eyes. We all ooh-ed and aah-ed appropriately, the works of art made all the more impressive by the fact that they were made in a day to be destroyed by the procession that night.
My two halves of Semana Santa were probably as unalike as two experiences in the same small country could be. One was filled with foreigners, the other with my Nicaraguan family. One with the sea the other with sawdust. One with an island, the other with a city. And one with blue, green, and white, and the other with plentiful reds, yellows, oranges, and purples. Yet both came overflowing with friends and laughter. And really, what more could I ask for?