Now Twice My Age...

This was my photo taken Stateside at LAX, the Los Angeles Airport, before embarking on my trip to Indonesia.  I have spent the year preparing for this journey with the US State Department and IREX.  I learned about the need for global education for all our students, and how to actually develop a curriculum with world perspectives that empowers them to becoming international citizens.  For two weeks, I will be visiting schools in Jakarta and Padang.  

A few minutes before I had the photo taken above, I realized I was at the same terminal 21 years ago.  I was actually carrying the same hiking backpack too.  Through another federal fellowship program, I was preparing for my year study abroad experience in China to learn about my parents' language, cultures, and histories.  It was a life changing trip, as it helped me articulate my identity as an American, and more importantly, as a complex, Chinese American that also could understand the native Chinese perspectives.  It gave me the skills to discern and understand global identities.  Anyway, so I was a global student then, and here I am 42 years years old, ready to be a global student again.  I know it will change me, and I am ready.