Emily Bowman is the Connecting Peoples Coordinator in Honduras
In May 2017, MCC Honduras had the opportunity to welcome a new kind of learning tour: past participants in MCC´s Summer Service Program (summer opportunities for young adults of color to serve in their communities) who came to learn about Intercultural Leadership in Honduras alongside the young adult movers and shakers of MCC Honduras and partners.
It was a rich and whirlwind style tour, but there were some moments that especially stood out. As the demographic of many of the learning tour that come to Honduras is mostly Caucasian and middle-aged, having instead a group of young adults of color (one of whose parents were actually Honduran) added a vibrancy and a new sense of solidarity to the connections that they were able to make with Hondurans.
Central Mennonite Church in San Pedro Sula. Anna Vogt.
At a meeting with the young adults of the Central Mennonite Church in San Pedro Sula, everyone played a card game together in groups while, unbeknownst to them, each person had gotten slightly different rules to the game. Through laughter and frustration, they tried to play together in spite of the language barrier and differences in rules. Afterwards, they sat in a circle to discuss how they had felt in the game and its metaphor for the challenges of intercultural leadership and communication.
The group began a fascinating discussion about language, word choice and slang. The Hondurans mentioned several English words that they had adapted to their normal vocabulary due to the influence of Western media and a lack of emotionally-charged history to accompany the use of the word, such as the N-word. The young adults from Summer Service were then allowed to explain the context of the word, its historical basis and the reasons why it was offensive or not offensive to them. This was then extrapolated to the theme of being leaders—how can we as intercultural leaders speak truth that shows dignity and respect to all those around us? How can we honor other cultures and learn to be curious and inquisitive instead of judgmental and operate from fear? The group didn’t have any answers by the end of the evening, but the rich discussion continued throughout the rest of the Learning Tour and beyond.
Alexa, Jairo and Luis working out some equations for their mechanics class, as part of the returned migrant project. Emily Bowman.
In the visit to CASM´s Returned Migrant Project, the group heard the story of one young man who had left Honduras due to gang related threats on his life and the lives of his friends for refusing to join the gangs. Instead, he tried to go to the US. Border Patrol apprehended him upon crossing the US border and he was held in detention in the United States for 3 months before being deported back to Honduras. When he arrived, he realized that all of his friends who had chosen to stay in Honduras, instead of fleeing, had been killed by the gangs. Now he was fighting for his own survival again.
One participant in the group, Talibah Aquil, told him with tears in her eyes:
On behalf of my country, I am so sorry that you were treated as a criminal instead of as someone who we should have welcomed with open arms. I am sorry we turned you away when you most needed help. We will not forget you. We hear you. We will continue to fight for the right to live with dignity and in places where you don´t need to fear. I am so, so sorry.
Bethel Assefa, another participant, then commented:
I am the daughter of Ethiopian refugees. My parents fled persecution and came to the United States with the same dreams and hopes and fears that drew you to migrate. They were accepted by the United States and you were rejected. That is not justice. I am a product of their bravery and strength, a child who was able to grow up in a new reality. We are exactly the same in so many ways, but I was lucky and you were not. Survival and admittance to the US shouldn’t be based on luck, privilege and discrimination. That is not justice.
There were many other moments of encounters between these Honduran young adult leaders, Summer Service participants, and MCC partners. These encounters demonstrate the great need to celebrate our multicultural world and contexts. This learning tour broke down stereotypes on multiple sides and was able to bring people from multicultural contexts together in yet another different multicultural context. These types of rich conversation are of paramount importance in our world today.