Voices: English Translation

For those of you who do not read Spanish and wanted to learn what David Klein had to say in his guest blog, below is an English translation.


I have to thank Caroline Dahmen for taking the time to translate this so beautifully. What amazes me about students like her and David is that they take initiative and make positive change. Caroline simply did the translation without being asked because she is both wise and kind. She knew that David's words were so wonderful that everyone should have a chance to read them.

She will be writing her own entry for you to read in the not too distant future. She is from the wonderful and beautiful country of Colombia and is working as a reporter there this summer. She could be a translator too.

 

The Table’s Secret: The Key for Happiness and Security at University

A month after starting my first job working with the United Nations in Haiti I have been asked to write about my experience as an international Latin student at my University. Writing about said experiences is today, for me, very significant, since the exercise of transporting myself back in time has made me remember that this very same table that I am writing these notes on, is the table that accompanied me for the last three years of college. This table witnessed dozens of written essays, hundreds of completed assignments and thousands of read pages. 

As I think back to my first year, when one arrives at the University for Orientation, I remember the mixed feelings: anxiety—imagining that one will spend the next four years of one’s life in this place—and excitement—imagining the adventures that will surely ensue in the next four years—. We feel so grown up, intelligent, mature, and we want to be seen in the same way, since other peers in the same position surround us: they too feel grown up, independent, mature. The interesting thing is that, those first days, walking around the dorms, the Grounds, or the Corner, and apart from the feelings I have described are our parents. In those moments they are the depiction that we are not yet “grown up”, because they buy us the school supplies, the backpack or the home appliances. They remind us that we are not independent, because they insist in following us everywhere; and that we are not mature, because they tell us, again and again, that we have to have good grades. During this period I thought that, the proper way to handle the situation was to show my parents that I could do it, that even though they are always going to be there for me, I can make it on my own. 

I started studying finances and economy, preparing for the School of Business, since that was my father’s line of work and thus was what more security gave me. Even though they told me that I could study whatever I wanted, they recommended classes based on the argument that, firstly they knew me well and secondly, the potential of their recommendations to bring me stability and security was great. I walked into my finance classes excited to discover that world that defined me so much. At the same time, I had also chosen other classes (the electives). Interestingly enough, when one asks someone what electives are, the answer is always the same: electives are the classes that interest you, the ones you can take, apart from the ones you have to take. I researched all the classes offered in UVA and chose the ones that caught my eye, the ones that interested me the most. I chose the classes that I felt I should take, not the ones I thought I should take. After three semesters of doing this—mixing classes that I had the obligation of taking with classes that I wanted to take—I always ended up with A’s in all the classes that I had wanted to take (Religion: Tibetan Buddhism, Anthropology: Globalization and Development, History of Art: Southeast Asian Art, Language: Mandarin, Music: African Music Groups and Dances, History: History of Genocide, English: Indian Literature) and B’s and C’s in all the classes that I had to take (Accounting: Accounting I and Administrative Accounting, Economics: Macro and Micro Economics, Mathematics: Advanced Calculus and Statistics, and a commerce course for minorities, for example Latin, Asian or African American students). When I saw the difference between the grades of the two types of course (the courses I had to take and the course I genuinely wanted to take). I realized that there was something wrong. The results showed something completely opposite to what I wanted. In my third semester I asked myself: Am I making the right decision with respect to my classes and my future? Am I creating security for my life? Why am I not feeling truly happy? I felt the need to study a semester in another country, far away from my friends and from all the confusion that I was feeling, so I could find the answers I was looking for. I left for six months in an exchange program to attend Sciences-Po Paris, one of the most prestigious universities in Europe for studies in Politics. Studying politics, with students who were passionate about the subject—students who, apart from the teachers, are the ones that question you and thus are teachers themselves—I found an answer. The way I could understand exactly what was wrong was the following: the classes that I thought I had to take weren’t the ones I wanted to take. And I realized that, it wasn’t like that. Actually, the opposite was true: the classes that I wanted to take were the ones that I had to take. During my time in Science – Po I shined in my classes, had the best grades, was motivated to write essays and read every letter of dozens of books. I wanted to argue, discuss and more than anything, I wanted to learn. The key to learning, I found out, is the enjoyment of it. And that realization made me understand what happiness is: the ability to exercising without any obstacles the enjoyment that comes from the deepest and purest of feelings. The highest enjoyment of all: That is happiness,

Coming back to my University, to this same table, I decided to stop ‘studying’ business, and rather ‘learn’ politics, anthropology, and east-Asian studies. I started out by saying that this table witnessed dozens of written essays, hundreds of completed assignments and thousands of read pages. I now end by saying that this table was, primarily, witness to my own true progress, independence and maturity. This table saw me happy, happy to learn—when I started working as a library clerk—what it means for others to have to study and work at the same time to pay their own expenses. It saw me happy, to know that I am making a difference for students in a global scale by publishing an essay about politics of university reform in a Journal of American Politics. It saw me happy, for those infinite intellectual journeys to fascinating worlds that were before unknown to me. It saw me happy for the crazy nights, the parties, the unrepeatable experiences with friends, each experience of them unique, for the hangovers, the ‘gomas’, ‘chuchaqui’ or whatever they call it where you come from. It is only now, coming back to this very table, that I realize that this table represents the essence of University: An environment completely free for the student to discover and pursue what the student likes. While there is genuine enjoyment in everything one does, one will always be happy. That freedom to find happiness through enjoyment was, in my case, taken by me, but it wasn’t given to me. I learned that for parents it is difficult to give that freedom because we, their children, are never going to be grown up for them. To their eyes we will always be their children, little. We will never be independent, because to their eyes they will always be there for us. And to their eyes we will never be mature, because even the parents end up keeping a little bit of their children. That freedom that I took made me genuinely happy and it is that freedom that gave me true security. Said happiness and freedom are the most precious things a parent can see and feel in his son. For you parents, to create that same happiness and freedom, don’t forget that when you come along your son or daughter in those first moments at the University, there is only one thing that is most important to leave them with: the table.