Why I didn't choose a home stay

A lot of study abroad programs, study abroad advisers  and professors harp on the potential benefits of doing a home stay in a foreign country because doing a home stay would help you understand the culture as well as help you improve your language skills much faster. While I don't argue with that statement, I will say that it robs you of everything else that you could possibly experience in another nation ( I mean good things of course! ), the most important of all the things that a home stay takes away from you is your independence.

Studying abroad in another country should teach you independence, it should teach you how to be adaptable and flexible, it should teach you to understand cultural differences, and it should help you improve your foreign language skills. Now, I think that doing a home stay would accomplish three of the four things but living in a dorm helps me accomplish all four things and it makes attending class much more convenient. My experience living in a dormitory here in National Chengchi University teaches me all of the following things and more. I have learned so much about the Taiwanese culture and experienced genuine independence. Living in a dorm, I get to set my own study schedule and my own schedule in regards to when I will come home. I may have had that independence even at Trinity but the lack of transportation hindered it quite a bit.

Here, the lack of a car does not prevent me from going where I want to go and seeing the places I want to see. I have the MRT, buses, taxis, long-distances buses, and the train at my disposal and I don't even pay that much for transportation here compared to what I have to pay for a car back in the states. When I look at it, the transportation system here just makes me more independent as I am free to use it to travel anywhere!

But what is it about this home stay that is such an unattractive prospect? Well, just like living in the same roof as your family, there are "rules". Rules that stipulate exactly at what time you should return home, perhaps how often you can go out with your friends, how much time you can spend navigating the internet, and maybe (if your host family is really that anal) curfew. Some host families may be more lax but they do tend to worry about you, if you spend most of your time outside of the home anyways. They still need to keep track of your whereabouts so that your family back at home is not worrying sick about you! Nevertheless, I would mind a group of people constantly checking up on me when I am trying to enjoy a journey that is emotionally fulfilling, a life changing experience, and an experience that is supposed to help me grow as a person. I have a need to be independent and without independence, I cannot learn. I cannot learn because being under somebody's thumb does not allow me to make my own mistakes and learn from them. It does not allow me to see the benefits and drawbacks of my decisions because most of the time my host family will be lecturing me on do's and dont's and what not.


Lastly, the biggest reason I mind staying with a host family is that it makes things really hard when you're trying to go out with friends and have fun. As I mentioned in the last paragraph about "rules", you tend to want to stay out as late as possible and enjoy your time on the weekends. That's not possible with a host family constantly worrying about you.

Conclusion

I don't think any of the above reasons should prevent you from doing a homestay if that is what you want to do. If you are okay with giving up some space and privacy to experience another family life, I admire you for doing something I am in capable of doing. However, when I evaluated what I wanted out of my experience, I prioritize independence on top of my list of things I want to learn when I study abroad. That could be difficult with a homestay where you are obligated to follow "rules" set by your family.

What I believe in having a plan rather than expectations: A lesson from study abroad

I have noticed that people often confuse "having a plan" for expectations. Having a plan means you know what you will do next and you may have made some modifications along the way. Having expectations on the other hand, is knowing you have a plan BUT you refuse to be flexible about your plans. Having expectations is like having unrealistic plan A with a less than optimum plan B and/or plan C. It feels as though you are putting so much of your heart and soul into one thing that you cannot envision other possibilities. What provokes me to write this sentiment is the unpredictability of the opportunities, blessings, successes, and failures my time in another country has brought to me. For example, I never thought I would have the opportunity to teach English to 10th grade students and learn about the Taiwanese education system from the perspective of the kids I am teaching. I have realized that I like to teach and mentor students. That was an opportunity to learn about what I like to do and what I don't like to do!

 You see, I am so used to having a strong control over the outcome of my decisions to the point where I valued predictability but then I realized that I was unfulfilled (this was in high school). Although predictability comforted my mind, I did not feel happy with it. I wanted to try things that interest me and things that are meaningful to me. I wanted to debate issues of interest and look at issues affecting the world that take place outside of America. I wanted an education that allowed me to inquire deeply about the world and what makes our world so complicated politically, socially, economically, and spiritually. At the same time, as I ventured outside of my comfort zone, these "expectations" I had of me did not disappear. The expectation of finding a successful career after graduation and becoming stable right away. I am starting to notice how much of this is fading away because I realized that there is so much more I need to learn about myself than previously thought. I need to learn much more about what else motivates me.

My study abroad journey has provided me some answers as to how I react to the world around me but it has left many more questions. First of all, why do I fear unpredictability even though I think it offers a life of variety? Will it lead me to a path where I initially did not think about being? If so, why do I fear this? Can this be a blessing in disguise?

What My Chinese Language Learning Abroad Taught Me About Myself: A Reflection on What is Changing

Yesterday, I had an epiphany about how my Chinese language learning has amounted to much more besides how many grammar structures and characters I have learned or whether or not I have refined the four basic skills (speaking, reading, listening, and writing).  Learning Chinese here in National Chengchi University has taught me the value of patience with myself because I don't think I learn as fast as I think I do. In other words, the more I attempt to learn this language, the more humble I feel. For you see, the minute I think I have mastered learning a set of characters or grammar structure, the more I realize that I have not really learned everything. I have only mastered part of the picture. Moreover, I have come to realize that learning is not about winning but it is just that learning. I had the tendency to think so much about what I have accomplished in terms of grades that I sometimes forgot the bigger picture. The bigger picture is forgetting to notice what I am really learning and how much I am learning. It seems though that I rarely give myself credit for learning but more for getting it right the first time. I suppose it's how I have been influenced.

"I often tend to attach meaning to grades and other forms of positive reinforcement as a reflection on what I am capable of and the hardest thing to do is letting go of that belief."

Having thought about these feelings, I have started to experience a sort of disillusionment with what I have always believed. If you aren't making good grades, then you aren't learning anything. Henceforth, you have wasted your time and what you're doing is not amounting to anything. The truth is the exact opposite. If you aren't focusing on your learning, naturally you are not going to make good grades and you won't learn anything. You can make good grades and not learn anything at all. This belief system that I have adopted fulfills me in multiple ways because it allows me to set measurable, achievable goals and at the same time achieve much more than just good grades. It allows me to absorb and retain what I have learned and put it all to application. Secondly, this belief system I have adopted makes me feel much more at ease with myself. It makes me feel that learning is not just about competition but about what you gained and what it means to you. It is about making your experience meaningful to you and letting your learning inspire you in ways that you may never imagine.