Board of Trustees

Having the Board of Trustees in class was an experience, not necessarily good or bad. The wierd thing about it was that you could almost feel everyone putting on a front in a way: dressing neatly and such. What was a little awkward for me was that I had a feeling that the man trustee was a Vietnam vet... but only in between our discussion of the Vietnam memorial and his introduction. It made me feel just awkward about everything, because at some points we must have been bringing up things that were sensitive material to him and he even said that he knew people who never came back from Vietnam. I felt maybe I was being a little insensitive, especially because I raised the idea that the memorials do not necessarily need evoke emotion in order to be effective in commemorating the war.

I would have been a little more sensitive if I had thought about it...I was even telling my group how when I was at Union Station the other day, I was sitting next to a Vietnam veteran and the fiancee of a man who served in Iraq. They were comparing and constrasting their two experiences which was so interesting. The Vietnam veteran was saying that "the war never goes away - it's with me 24/7, 365". It was interesting to eavesdrop on their two stories.

Still - I was thought having the Trustees there brought an interesting perspective to the class and allowed us to see things on a different level with, in a sense, more adults in the room.

On a different note, this whole spiel with the war memorials (in addition to reading Tim O'Brien's book The Things They Carried, has ignited my interest in war again, if that makes any sense. In fact, my revelation just now (as I told Keara, Molly and Anna) was that I want one of my concentration areas in SIS to be Peace and Conflict Resolution!! haha! Good moment. I kind of already knew that, but I just made sense of why I wanted to do it. I've always had an interest in war and its causes and consequences and such...

So all in all - I've enjoyed my war themed classes this week and will continue to =]

p.s. Invisible Man is pretty disturbing - point of discussion for anyone who know's what I'm talking about, but also a disclaimer =]