November 17th, 2016: Stephen McAndrew and the Emergency International Red Cross

Stephen McAndrew was a fabulous speaker and I was really appreciative of the opportunity to hear him speak. As a student who's going through the college application process, I was very surprised and relieved to hear that he had no intentions of working in the Red Cross. I was inspired by the fact he didn't have a set path and just started volunteering with the Red Cross to do something good for humankind. I was moved by his compassion and empathy. Mr. McAndrew really helped to bring to light very serious issues that we have had in our world regarding the refugee and Ebola crisis. Despite such solemn topics, Mr.McAndrew was able to bring some humor and joy into the room. His message of unity was really prominent to me. I now believe that unity in times of trouble rather than disconnect is the answer. I was so glad to listen to such an international superstar who has interacted with a huge variety of cultures. 

November 9th, 2016: Lunch with Nirayama High School Students

Japanese students visited Poly from Nirayama High School and I got the exciting chance to eat lunch and converse with these students for a short while. I was really happy to talk to these students that really were also excited to share their culture with us. They tried to help us pronounce their names right and also tried to teach us some fun Japanese words. Although I can't even remember any of the words they tried to teach us, I really appreciated their efforts. We had Nirayama's Cheer Leader sitting at our table and he explained the significance of his armband to us. It has their school logo which are the horns of a dragon because the translation of their high school in English has the word Dragon. We watched him tie his red wraps as seen in the picture which seemed really complicated. He was very excited to perform for us and we couldn't wait to see our new friend lead his fellow students. They sang us their school song and we were quite impressed and gossiped about wanting our own school song. I really loved getting to hear about their experiences at their school and definitely wished I had the space to host a student! I can't wait for our next group of exchange students to come visit. :)