Hi there
I hope you all had a good Easter!
Time is moving fast and you have already started week 5 of the programme. I heard from Soliya that groups are reaching a healthy level of conflict as you manage to connect the political to the personal and explore your differences constructively - and also manage to discuss more emotionally charged topics. This is ggreat.
I'm glad many of you also seem to have started your small group activity to further explore a 'difference' that exists in your respective communities. Keep up the good work!!
I know that most of you this week will be exploring Life Stories in your groups, this is a very important activity for the group dynamics, and one of the activities that past students have reported as being most significant, so please do your best to be at the session on time, and don't leave early!! I have received attendance reports, and I'm very glad that most of you are punctual and always present, so well done!!
I look forward to reading your Week 5 diaries this week - enjoy your sessions!
Best,
Francesca
I hope you all had a good Easter!
Time is moving fast and you have already started week 5 of the programme. I heard from Soliya that groups are reaching a healthy level of conflict as you manage to connect the political to the personal and explore your differences constructively - and also manage to discuss more emotionally charged topics. This is ggreat.
I'm glad many of you also seem to have started your small group activity to further explore a 'difference' that exists in your respective communities. Keep up the good work!!
I know that most of you this week will be exploring Life Stories in your groups, this is a very important activity for the group dynamics, and one of the activities that past students have reported as being most significant, so please do your best to be at the session on time, and don't leave early!! I have received attendance reports, and I'm very glad that most of you are punctual and always present, so well done!!
I look forward to reading your Week 5 diaries this week - enjoy your sessions!
Best,
Francesca
Dear diary,
RispondiEliminaOn Monday 6th of April I had my fifth Soliya’s session and this time was amazing!
Initially we started our conversation talking about how we spent our Easter’s Sunday and if we had had a lovely time with our dear ones.
Then last Monday we experienced and shared a new activity with all the group because our facilitators asked us to describe two pictures regarding a personal life experience.
A couple of days before Easter, our facilitators Anee and Manar asked us to send them two pictures that could be our family photos, group photos, photos from holiday or an important event or a place that we a fond of, and would like to share with the others.
There were only six of us plus our facilitators because Paula and Najhem didn’t connect instead we could hear Bochra but didn’t see because she had many technical problems.
Most of us decide to choose a picture with our family took in a particular life’s event such as friend’s wedding, Christmas time, graduation day or summer holiday.
Surprisingly we could know something more not only about the other families’s students but in particularly about their own cultures and traditions.
All of us chose the same type of picture because while the first picture represented our family, in the second ones we could share our hobbies or sport activities.
Paula, for example, shared her interesting for Indian dance and described a photo where her friends worn typical Indian and colorful dresses; in Brian and Meryem’s photo we could know something more about camping and Michaela talked about her father’s little boat.
We talked about our life stories for more than half an hour because then we decided to continue talking about last Monday’s topic.
Last week Meryem was absent so she couldn’t join with us to an interesting religion’s discussion after we have read some articles as homework.
Immediately, Manar our facilitator, asked us if we felt free and at ease in discussing this topic, and we agreed that it was a good opportunity even if everyone had a different thought but we respected each other's point of views.
Then Meryem asked to the group if religion could be the base for an extremist group as Isis but Muslim people said that their behavior doesn’t respect religion but they use religion for political aims and they are getting bigger and bigger in the Arabian’s territories.
They simply use religion to justify terrible actions they take and contribute to making image of all Muslims as bad people.
An other significant question was if we would separate religion from science or if this wouldn’t be possible.
Some people said that religion could overcome science because hope and faith are indispensable in our life and even if there are differences like in praying, religion teaches us to respect other people in every situation.
Both in Christanity and Islamic’s faith we all believe that it’s important to help the homeless, the widows and fatherless and poor people but one of the fundamental difference comes from religion and government policies.
We had a very constructive dialogue all the time till the last ten minutes, when Manar asked us to think about other topics that we would like to discuss in the coming weeks.
We chose three main topics such as abortion, gender and human right and we will prepare three questions about these topics for next Monday’s discussion.
Before our final greetings, Anee asked us how we could describe our feelings after last Monday’s session and our answers were quite similar because all of us were enthusiastic for pictures’s activity then we could discuss, as every sessions, topics of our interest as an occasion to know people a little bit more sharing our views without being judged.
I’m very happy to talk and make friends with all of them!
Federica
Dear diary,
RispondiEliminaLast Monday I had my fifth Soliya meeting and it began with the same game as last week, but this time each of us, except facilitators, had to propose 5 statements, and who agreed had to put up thumbs. There were 6 of us plus the facilitators and we could get to know each other even better.
I learnt that all girls of my group, including myself, support abortion law, and that nobody, except me, is in favour to use renewable energy. However, I was surprised that most of my fellow students support the death penalty and the use of torture.
In Europe all this is unusual because the EU is engaged to promote clean energy and to stop torture and death penalty. This made me realize that there are many differences in opinions especially in Western country.
Then we made another game that was very funny! We were expected to guess and to draw the animal that one of the facilitators described. We all drew an Elephant, except one who drew a Hyena, but we were wrong: the animal described was an Ant-eater! We considered the importance of listening to the entire message, and we realized that each one can interpret the same message differently, the same what happens with news of Media. We agreed sometimes that the Media gives out information and tends to put emphasis on less important news, and manipulates the way we see things; for this reason we shouldn't judge the first thing we see and we should make distinction between different sources and different mediums.
We also spoke about Twitter and Facebook and their advantages and disadvantages. Honestly, I rarely use them, so I didn't know much about them, but my fellow students, who use them regularly, claimed that they aren't often credible sources. They find Facebook is good to have other points of view to know what's going on in the World.
Then we talked about freedom of speech and its importance. One of my facilitators reminded us about the attack on Charlie Habdo in February. We agreed that killing is not the solution, but Muslim students explained to us that they find it very offensive when people mock others from different religions; the article tends to offend others but never its self.
Some of us concluded that freedom of speech is fine, but not to provoke hatred and disrespect, while others felt that everyone should be free to say what ever they like, and if it's disrespectful, it can be ignored.
Finally facilitators told us the topic for next week: personal stories!
Omega
Dear diary,
RispondiEliminamy latest Soliya session(April 8, 2015), was, in my opinion, one of our best and most exciting meetings. We’ve started talking about the Easter holidays and we watched a video called “Awareness test”(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ahg6qcgoay4&feature=youtu.be); then, we were asked to share our thoughts and impression on video, but none of us had much desire to do so. Lisanne, at that point, explained to us the four “group stages”, which are: “1st stage is a polite stage, 2nd characterized by conflict, 3rd start to learn from each other, last one- start to transfer this to your group of friends, family or community”. For some members of the group we were at the 2nd stage, while some others said we were still at the1st stage. Before this last session, I thought we were at the 2nd level , but now I can say things changed , a lot actually.
Nora had prepared for us another fun activity, which involved drawing this time too. There were some statements on which she instructed us to drawn a upward or downward arrow if the statements applied to us; the upward arrow indicates a “privilege”, while the downward arrow an “oppression”. Unexpectedly, the results were pretty surprising, at least for me. “Privileges” are some facts or events that happened only thanks to my hard work and my family’s support and I always considered those facts as normal, I take them for granted, and I never considered them as privileges; on the other hand, “oppressions“ are all those things that come from outside and are beyond my control. It is not impossible, however, to eliminate the effects of this oppressive situations by improving our self; in my case this meant learning a new language and trying to become part of the new society in which I lived and still live, the Italian society. One at the time, we all shared our personal experience and we all agree on the fact that we gave more importance to “oppression”, which, in some cases could mean even daily clash. As Nora told us latter the purpose of this activity was to show the various types of inequality and how this is manifested.
Gibson then asked us what do we think about gay marriage and the discrimination against homosexuals. He was more interested in knowing the opinion of those living outside the US. Me, Hamdi and Ameen, we explained the difficult situation of the homosexual community in our countries, the legal implications (as Ameen told us, in Morocco, some behaviors are punished by law). We also discuss the connection between religion and same-sex marriages in the US; as Kiaira said, some States, that are more religious, do not allow marriage between two people of the same sex, however she said, the situation is slowly changing.
We also discuss the welfare state in our countries, if it exists and how it works; related to this we discussed the policies aimed to help those that don't have a job anymore or those that can't or don't want to have a job. We explained a little bit more the operation of the Welfare state and how there are (too) many people that abuse it. Our fellows, Amine and Hamdi, instead told us that in their countries, the welfare state helps only those that contribute to its support and maintenance. Furthermore we talked about how the labor market works in our country and if there are discriminations or inequalities. Everyone agrees that sometimes inequalities exist, no matter if you're female or male, your race or age. Amine has started to describe the situation, but now our time together had come to an end, so did not have time to explore the topic.
As last thing, Lisanne asked us our impressions on this session; we all appreciated the time spent together and we all think we have reached the third stage of the group, I mentioned earlier, namely, that in addition to being more comfortable with the others we also learned new things, not only about our countries but also about ourselves.
Maria
Dear Diary,
RispondiEliminaLast Wednesday I had my fifth session, and it is difficult to explain the good feeling I had: I was so moved by the session that I felt like crying. I can’t believe that the Soliya program can give me all this emotions and satisfaction. I also noticed that my English has improved thanks to all the activities: reading various articles about different topics, writing the diary every week and speaking with my peers are very useful exercises.
After these reflections, I will talk about the last session, which was very interesting!
After the usual regards and the Easter wishes, we talked about the Final Project. Salma divided us into small groups, I spoke with Rafy about my topic, which is Environment. I was very interested to know why in America there aren’t so many policies about environment. There is only the waste recycling, but there aren’t subsidies for renewable energy. He told me that he hates plastic bottles because for him (and also for me) it pollutes the world. He asked me if I have ever seen the electric car Toyota Prius, and I answered that I have never seen one in Italy, while he saw it in Washington DC (where he currently lives).
After that we talked about his topic: immigration. I explained to him that in Italy there is a complicated situation: we have a lot of immigrants coming from Africa, and in my opinion we haven’t an adequate law to face it. A good law about it can help all these people escaping from wars, but I also think that Europe must realize a much more capable immigration policy. I hope that for next years we will be able to have a fair immigration policy, and that one day we will have a globalized and open-minded country like the United State of America.
I talked with Rafy for twenty minutes, and then we did a “game” with all the group: we had to write in a piece of paper three words for each of these four regions: North America, Middle East, West Europe and South Europe. It was very interesting to see the different perceptions we had of these regions. We talked about the stereotypes that we have about middle East like terrorism, war etc. It was also funny to see that there were some words regarding Europe like food, art and holiday, and I told them that if there were only these positive words about Europe, I was very lucky!
Next week we will talk about stereotypes.
When I left the chat and closed my computer I was sad, because this experience is going to end.
I am looking forward for the next session.
See you soon!
Lucia
Dear diary,
RispondiEliminalast Wednesday it was my fifth Soliya’s meeting.
Unfortunately, this session was perturbed by connection problems for most of us, so we skipped the one to one discussion for our final project.
Mr Derek, our facilitator, was connected in safe mode but, with the help of Hiba, was anyway able to lead a good discussion. I think that our facilitators are very competent. They often ask if we are enjoying the dialogue or if we have any questions about the process.
We began discussing the expectations we had about the Soliya project and its outcome. All of us were happy about the good interaction and the possibility to meet the views of people that live in other countries.
The session continued on how to understand at best those with whom we interact on a daily basis. The discussion started from these questions:
Do you feel that you are able to be fully open and honest? Why or why not?
Do you feel that you’ve said all that you want to say? How can we improve on the dialogue?
I think that it is easy to speak with people from other countries because different views emerge and we can learn from them. Moreover, the friendly environment makes it simpler to be open and honest because there is no judgment on the way. In general, when we display different views we can also learn to see the same issue from different perspectives. Each one of us has a different background and different experiences.
Then we discussed the way people ask questions. We made some examples of questions of daily use such as "How are you" or "What do you want to in the future" and we discussed how these question are made for formality or education. Most of the times that depends on the person that asks the question and prompts a different answers!
Derek explained that there are at least four different kinds of questions: 1. Yes/No questions, 2. Cross-examination, 3. Points of clarification, 4. Open-ended questions. He wanted us to make some examples. I learnt that some questions open a discussion while others don’t.
Then, Hiba started to show us a picture and asked what we could see and what caught our attention.
The picture displayed two areas: the first included two words "positions" and "conclusions", the second was larger and included more words as "wounds", "needs", "observations", "belief" and others. This area was located below the first one. We discovered that the picture wants to represent an iceberg and when you meet someone you only see the tip of the iceberg and not what it is below the water line: we catch only "positions" and "conclusions" and not what is underneath.
From this session I learnt that sometimes people have different moods and this can affect the dialogue and how it goes.
I'm looking forward to participate to next week session.
Marina
Dear diary,
RispondiEliminaThis is the fifth meeting in Soliya. I am very happy with my participation. Every week we discuss very important issues. These issues lead to further discussion very deep between different cultures.
We have the opportunity to interact with each of us, to learn something different about religion.
Unfortunately this week, as soon as I connected it burned the current transformer.
I had no way to connect in Soliya. I was able to tell my facilitators, I was told not to worry.
Shqiprim.