variations on the theme of grey/place matters!

 pre-snowfall Tetovo

I can see how Tetovo in winter is one testament to the color grey. and the many faces it can take. the first snow fell today--not exactly picturesque white flakes (more like icy pellets), but it left everything cold, crunchy and white. especially in the twilight (which settles in about 4 pm), everything, even the bright new buildings (yellows, oranges) become muted, slowly giving into the monochrome. however--on saturday Culi, Julie and I took a little excursion to Skopje to visit the German embassy which was having a christmas bazaar (although finding the embassy was half the fun). but getting out of Tetovo, out from under the shadow of the mountains, they're breathtaking. I think I could commute to Skopje just to look at the mountains every day. and watch them change.

but I guess that's what winter's all about everywhere. and considering I was walking in a tanktop on saturday, I can't complain too much. oddly, the greens in the grass and hardy vines, looked like spring greens. but today's snow proved that we have not gotten so globally hot that we can skip winter altogether.

Today a woman from the US embassy in Latvia came and spoke at the University about education and diversity in Latvia. one of the points she made was that non-native speakers of Latvian have to take a test in Latvian in order to become full citizens, to receive the right to vote. and that this policy virtually excludes upwards of 15% of society from voting. I'm not sure this is totally sustainable--but she continued that thusfar this hasn't created a lot of tension--or at least anger (as perceived by an American/outsider. perhaps Anger isn't quite as cross-culturally readable as I/we assume). and that many people have accepted being, in essence, outside the system altogether.

which is interesting because here, I get the sense that many citizens also feel completely isolated from the system because politics are so corrupt (does having the right to vote matter all that much when politics are influenced/impacted by outside variables? yes, this is probably a little bit of a pessimistic reading of the situation. just for fairness' sake, you could also say the same kind of thing about the American electoral system--either just about the Electoral College, or about politics in general. I'm not sure I want to go down this road much further, but we can if it's interesting). but I wonder how having a fake, or at least not totally realized, right (such as the right to vote in a not totally transparent political system (how's that for diplomatic speak?))  impacts political engagement--as opposed to those who have accepted that they don't have a place within the system. because I think it's fair to say that apathy is a problem--here and back home, and especially among young people. and I wonder what kind of apathy is manifested in Latvia (other than the apathy bred by economic woes, high unemployment and the likes)--and if we should actually be speaking about apathies--not just a singular apathy. are all apathies equal?

I don't want to paint the picture that everyone is apathetic--because I know otherwise. One of my on-line students a few weeks ago posted about how on-line learning has made her into an independent learner (music to my ears!). there's the Loja family--and oh so many others like them actually out there. doing things. there are colleagues here at the university, our students. but what is interesting to me is what appears to be outside the realm of change (to me, the source of apathy, in this case namely politics)--and what do people feel they have some agency over/with. Education (not surprisingly) seems to be one area where people feel they an actually have an impact, where change can actually happen. and it's been really inspirational to work (again) with my on-line, part-time students, all of whom (or many of whom) intend to become teachers. for each of them, there was someone or someones who left a large enough impression on them that they were inspired to become teachers--even within a system which still clings to old methods of teaching, and is mired with other problems (pay of teachers, or infrastructure, for example. let alone some of the honking-huge issues of schools as places where broader societal tensions get played out (or at least that's how I see, or can see, it)). it's really heartening to then also feel a part of their process of growth and development. like one of my students wanted to know more about Nel Noddings' 'an ethic of care' and another (and this just makes me delighted) used his educational biography for our class to make a case for place-based education--although I'm not sure he know's theres a word for it, let alone a whole branch of pedagogy. little does he know what can of worms, what Pandora's box, he's getting into.
especially with this lady.