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| Inside the subway! |
Yay!
We got free morning!! This morning is our free time, we can explore the city,
we can sleep at the hotel, or we can do our laundry (emm..okay)! But, we agreed
to try riding the subway to the nearest mall called Gallery ! Thank you to Ms.
Yeni, she’s the only Indonesian staff there, we called here “ Mama Bebek”,
means mother of duck, well it’s because she’s like our own mother there, she
always make sure we got our need and we’re comfortable with that. So, she also
makes us to try and to learn how to ride subway, super excited! If you wonder
why, it’s because we never ride subway, we don’t have it in our country.
Riding subway is easy, convenient, and cheap, just don’t forget to
bring the map, if you forget to bring it, you don’t have to be panic, there’s
always the officer who’s willing to help you! After walk for quite far, we
found the subway station, we got 2 coins worth for 3 dollars, and then we
looked for the gate heading to the Gallery. Just put the coin into the machine
and ta-da! You can enter the gate, but still you have to wait the train. The
subway is quite clean and comfy, if it’s full, then we have to stand, of course
seniors and disabilities people always having first priority to have the seat. 
After 10-15 minutes, we arrived at the
Gallery. Well, this isn’t the biggest mall in Philadelphia, my impression is this building seems old fashioned (
Philadelphia is one of the
oldest ity in US), but still it doesn’t stop us to go shopping! Starting from
branded shops, or regular shops, we can find there! We walked and shopped
there, oh yeah, and since it’s free morning, we got to buy our own lunch! Hmm,
what should we eat?
Some of
us decided to eat at The Gallery, the rest wanted to try the Food Truck that
park along road in Temple University area. We went back home using subway and
with our things! Okay, let me tell you about food truck, you will have wide
variety of options! You can have halal food here, so my moslem friends didn’t
find difficulty to buy food there are also, Chinese Food, Japanese, Korean,
western, and you can have it with affordable price for students! :D
After
having short(stil fun) free time, we went back to lecture activity with topic
“Introduction to Democracy and US Government”, this is important lesson for us
so that we could understand how the democracy system in US started, and how
religious pluralism was held and the connection with US constitution. Our
lecturer is very special! Mr. Grant Calder, for me, he’s very charismatic
person, and a lecture with his own style and uniqueness that make us willing to
hear more and more story from him!
We were
very enthusiastic in today lecture, we asked lots of things to Mr. Grant
Calder, we heard lots of stories from him about important figures in US. Short
resume for the lecture, Mr.Calder told us how the first idea of freedom of
religion (first time in world history) hat came out from William Penn ( founder
of Pennsylvania), he told us the background of William Penn that made him decided like that. One more
interesting thing, he told us the
story how US chose to separate itself from Colonial started from
creativity, and bravery to think out of the box. Beautiful quote from Tom
Paine, “ In America the LAW is KING whereas in England KING is LAW”. Such a
genius!
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| Coffee break during the lecture! In the left side, the one with green shirt, that's Mr.Grant Calder!! |
However,
the independence of U.S in 1776 doesn’t mean their struggle is ended there. U.S
still struggles, even now, to achieve the real justice. Bill of Rights is the
next big step to achieve a great and
stable nation where the first amendment states the freedom of religion,
freedom of speech, freedom of the
press, freedom to assemble, and freedom to to offer petition. It’s not ended
yet there, U.S still struggling to achieve the real welfare by abolishing the
idea of slavery. Maybe for us, who live in this present time would think that
slavery is indeed wrong! No matter how we look at it, it’s wrong and really
cruel. But for people in the past time, almost no one thought that it’s wrong.
They thought that it’s just the way it meant to be. It took times for them to
finally realize that slavery is wrong. The whole nation kept struggling and debating
whether slavery should be abolished or not. They even experienced such a
terrible moment, Civil War, the biggest war ever until 1861 where the nations
war against themselves, fighting about justice, struggling about slavery issue.
The greatest African American figure in my opinion ( since I heard the story of
him) is Frederick Douglass, a slave who fought for the right of slaves through
his brilliant thinking, using U.S constitution itself as the protection for
slaves, while others who pro with slavery always using U.S Constitution to
defend the slavery.
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| See our happy faces! :) |
Not only we learn about U.S
history and democracy system, but we also learn how to think “out of the box”
in order to seek justice and truth, and how we need bravery to reveal it. But,
our extraordinary day isn’t ended yet, we were about to meet some U.S students
to have a dinner together! Hurray!
Our staffs had such a brilliant idea to make us getting to know each other
well and get comfy to start the conversation, and to make us not having the awkward moment! Starting from using the name tag, and
then introduce ourselves to others, and then they even prepared certain topics
just in case we’re out of topic! :D. However, they don’t need to do that,
because we were having very long conversation, and we had lots of topic to talk
about!
Starting from
their habits, what they learn, and so many things! The delicious food that
prepared for us couldn’t beat our happiness for having opportunity to talk and
interract with our new friends! We really enjoyed that night so we didn’t want
that night ended, so many stories and experiences that we got. And FYI, our
friends are just awesome and funny! From this interaction we began to know more
about the real America, not just through television, we experienced being
American for real!
And again FYI, lots of U.S
students here are very clever! Starting from homeschooling student but he won
robotic championship and even already employed , and many more stories about
them. Just be patient, this is our first meeting, we’re having our next dinner
again! Curious with our stories? Or maybe you wanted to ask something? Feel
free to leave a comment!
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| Indonesians and Americans are all friends!! :D |
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