Building Bridges
The concept of building bridges is ringing a bell for many of us, but what does it really mean and how do we do it? Bridges connect. They give the opportunity of interaction between two parties which have been separated before. I knew I will build bridges and lifelong bonds with new friends the moment I decided to study in the United States at the University of South Carolina Salkehatchie. What I did not know exactly was how to build those bridges.
Within the first week of school my University 101 teacher Mrs. Brewer gave us the task to build a bridge between two tables using only straws and marshmallows. During the class I was not thinking about the deeper meaning of the task until I reflected my first school year in May 2016. Looking back at my first year at the University of South Carolina Salkehatchie I noticed how many friends and bonds I created in just one year. I could now call teammates, coaches, teachers, staff members, and even Allendale natives my friends. Now I understood the intentions of the task in Mrs. Brewer’s University 101 class. She was teaching the most important lesson of life in a global society: building bridges to connect between people from every background, every nation, every religion, and every culture.
The picture shows the first part of the bridge. This symbolizes what southern hospitality was to me. The people I have met here in the south had always one-third of the bridge already built. The boldest example I can give for this is a family from Beaufort that became a second family to me when they made their home mine for Christmas break. Tori, her brothers Michael and Frisco, and her mom and dad are now my “home-away-from-home”. They introduced me to the rest of their family and they took me to Decibel Church at the Battery Creek High School auditorium on Sunday mornings to show me the most amazing church-experience I had in my life so far. I did not know that church itself could feel like a rock concert with a piece of advice wrapped in it.
On the left, you can see my side of the bridge which has to be built by myself through openness, kindness, interest, and curiosity.
This part of the bridge, as well as the other side of the bridge, should be there at any point in order to be ready for new connections which will finish the bridge with the deciding middle part.
The middle part is where the actual building takes place. Both sides working hand-in-hand in order to create the connection from one side to the other. This middle piece is made from everything the two sides share with each other. It involves every memory, every experience, every problem, and every solution. It makes the bridge what it is. A bond between the two sides.
If you compare the right and left third of the bridge from the first two pictures with the picture of the finished bridge, you can see that both sides had to adjust the angle in order to carry the middle third. This shows that neither side can stay in their position if we want to build a stable connection. We can project those adjustments to our behavior as we need to compromise in order to achieve agreement. We can only build bridges when we value, understand, accept, and respect each other.
The school-start lunch party at “the Grove” which is a little pond located on the east campus of the University of South Carolina Salkehatchie, The 2016 scholarship banquet where I met my teacher, scholarship donor, and friend professor Joe Siren together with Dean Carmichael, the trip to the USC Gamecocks football game, and the adventures with my friends and roommates are just some examples of results of the many bridges I built here at the University of South Carolina Salkehatchie.
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