Spreading Peace, One brat at a time

Since small villages don’t have middle schools for students to attend, they come to larger towns such as ours for the school year and stay in dorms. With the new school year fast approaching, many new boys are hanging out in town, many boys who have never seen us before. Quite often we hear calls of “Aromi” (meaning literally Christian, but used to refer to all foreigners) from the distance and then “Bonjour!” At this point we have two options, one being ignore the brat, two being take a few minutes to explain who we are and what we’re doing. Usually we opt for explaining that we’re from America and therefore speak English and that we are living in their town for two years. In reward for our few minutes, they usually get a kick out of talking to the weird foreigners but also get a chance to realize, hey these people are living here just like me and they even speak my language a little, granted with a terrible accent! …Maybe these guys aren’t so bad after all! (And we leave thinking, hey that kid wasn’t such a brat, he just had no idea who we were and what to expect of us!) And there you have it, small steps to spreading worldwide peace. It may seem inconsequential, but slowly one turns to five then to ten and then the whole town sees Americans through a different light.