My project in Bulgaria starts on Aug 1, and my family and I have planned a few days in Istanbul before I leave for Sofia. The external forces that influenced Bulgaria the most included Byzantine and Ottoman, and it would be nice to know more about those cultures, too.
While in Istanbul, I was asked by some local girls to take a photo with them. I couldn’t help laughing as when I led the WCU students to China before, they were asked by some locals to join their photos then, as they stood out to be foreigners. Am I the foreigner in Istanbul now?
When I visited Japan, it would not be so easy to tell apart our ethnicity. While in the U.S., the ethnicity of the population is so diverse, I guess that no one would think that a foreigner is rare to be photo-worthy.
Well, that’s the exact experience we want to explore. What does it mean to be a foreigner, and what do we want to know when we ask others where they are from? How would you treat foreigners? Were you foreigners at times?
What would you answer?
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