American Diversity and Culture Day!

Earlier in August, Hima, Manisrenggo’s CL during PST, and I planned “American Diversity and Culture Day” in Pare, East Java, where Kampung Inggris is located. Kampung Inggris, or English Village, is a small part of Pare where many students come to learn the language. There are a number of private courses offered, and Hima was working as a teacher at one of companies. Thankfully, the event went very well! There were almost 100 people that attended, and a lot of important and relevant topics were brought up in conversation throughout the day.

During one of our bahasa Indonesia tutoring sessions, we began discussing American culture and PCV experiences, and how we had wished there was an opportunity for young Indonesians to learn more about the United States. Hima had also expressed how many of her students in Kampung Inggris were not aware of certain opportunities to study in the US. With that, we had the idea of hosting some sort of cultural day in Pare, where Hima was teaching at the time. We formed a planning committee that included the two of us, as well as two employees of the venue it would be held, Global English.

The three main objectives of the event were to 1) Let Indonesians learn more about the United States and to share ideas that are important to both Americans and Indonesians; 2) Introduce English-learners to American culture, with the intention of offering new perspectives on diversity and what it means to be American; and 3) Hold sessions that focused on diversity, values, stereotypes, and also food, holidays and festivals, slang, and information on the education system, scholarships and TOEFL tips. The first two hours of the morning were devoted to American cultural behaviors (and the Iceberg theory!) and a panel-type discussion on diversity in the US, which included PCV’s experiences in Indonesia relating to both those topics. After a coffee break, where more informal discussions were had, participants broke out into smaller and shorter sessions about various topics on US culture and education for about an hour.

Most of the volunteers decided to spent the weekend in Kediri, our training city, to meet with former host families and to hangout at familiar spots while relaxing with friends. I am so grateful for all the work and support from fellow PCVs, Bones, Elisa, Gina, Jessica Garcia, Kieran, Sarah, Trum and Vaughn, and from the volunteers at Global English. Without their help, there’s no way the day would have happened so well.

Here are some photo's from the day: