North America, South, and Back

The program was aimed at field-based learning and immersion into Bolivian life and culture, so we stayed one by one in Bolivian host-families, worked on our Spanish with experienced professors practically every day, and traveled to an incredible variety of places in Bolivia. Also from the academic perspective, this wasn't the typical study abroad program, where you go to the same type of lectures as you would at your home institution, except in a different (typically European) city. Instead, our subjects were all focused on Bolivia and the places we were visiting - thus we learned about the history of the country, of colonization, about social and political change, historical traumas and how they play out in contemporary society, but also a lot about poverty, racism, and the worldview and philosophy of various native populations. All this theoretical knowledge was then well complemented by direct hands-on experience from the places it pertains to - we visited La Paz, El Alto, Sucre, Santa Cruz, and Potosi, spent two days each with native families at Isla del Sol in Lake Titicaca as well as in the Amazon native village named Santa Rita, as well as the small town Concepcion with incredible wooden churches and other structures built by Jesuits.

Bolivia turned out to be a great place for a program of this type: Spanish spoken here is somewhat slower and better comprehensible than in the neighboring South American countries, it is one of the very few countries where the native and mestizo population outnumbers the whites, and is replete with natural diversity, ranging from vast high plains in altitudes above 4000 meters (La Paz), through hilly valleys with an impeccable climate (Cochabamba), all the way to the completely flat and low Amazon basin (Santa Cruz).

It was this combination of lectures and field experience that made our takeaways, I believe, much richer than those of any tourist - we spoke to the poor miners of Potosi, crushed plantains in a mortar while talking to a native family about their children's school, but also saw that even where there is dire need (and where there isn't), Bolivians can enjoy life, spread good will and hospitality, and a positive attitude.

Another intriguing aspect to the whole experience was being "the foreigner among foreigners" - I was the only non-American in the program, and so I had a different set of comparisons and attitudes towards various things in mind, and also the Bolivians themselves viewed me differently than the other "gringos". This made even the in-class discussions more interesting, as I was able to offer a different perspective on socialism and central planning, the elements of which the Morales government is currently trying to introduce, than some of my young American liberal peers.

Personally, the Bolivian adventure was an immense learning experience in terms of culture, globalization, the clash of modernity and tradition, ecology and capitalism, good governance, the advantages and drawbacks of democracy, and many other things. To get out of the Western world for three and a half months and view it through the eyes of a different culture is, in my opinion, incredibly enriching and I firmly believe that both these "official" experiences as well as the unforgettable personal stories will help me in thinking about certain problems and issues in a deeper, more balanced way, and hopefully also aid me in building a better "adult" life for myself.

Because that's not all that far. I only have two quarters left at Northwestern and I graduate in June. It is time to start looking around for jobs or other opportunities to gain experience. In the upcoming winter quarter (January - March), I'll be in three economics courses and one communications class. The economic ones include behavioral economics, economic history of Western Europe in the 20th century, and economics of gender, while my last communications course will be on bargaining and negotiation with one of the legendary professors in the School of Communication.

With a bunch of incredible months behind me, I'll be striving to make not only the last few college-bound months but also the ones afterwards just as great.