A Love Letter to America, by Tara S.

Tara

Muhanga District, Southern Province

My Love Letter to America

Dear America,

This is my love letter to you.  You, America, are far from perfect and continue to develop and change but I want to take this space and time to express why I love you.  In my opinion, most people love you because of your economic and diplomatic leadership, or for your glory in war and foreign affairs or your global media and cultural domination, but the reasons I love you America I would have never discovered if I had not left you.

As a young woman from a rural area in America, there are natural factors working against my success and opportunities in life.  In many parts of the world, young girls education is not valued and they are not given the skills and opportunities to thrive.  Yet even though I am from a town of just 5,000 people, I was able to receive a high school that allowed me to go to college and receive scholarships.  My education was individualized, pushing for my success while the education system also worked with my peers who struggled, so at the end we were all prepared for the next step.  In that education, I was taught skills such as critical thinking, public speaking, and using the resources I had available.  As a woman I was never shamed for things I said, but instead encouraged to express my opinions and successes.  While to another American, this may seem like a standard, but it is not necessarily so.  Around the world children, especially girls, from rural areas struggle to access good education.  Girls especially are not encouraged to hold their own opinions or be anything more than a a wife and mother in their cultures. America, I love  you because you allowed me to be more and to dream for more. 

When I finished my secondary education, I went to college on scholarships.  At college I was not a minority, but part of the greater majority.  America you encourage girls so much, that the number of women at colleges and universities outnumbers men.  This too is a unique and exciting development in our history, that is only slowly occurring around the rest of the world.  At college, I was encouraged to explore my studies until I found what excited me most, and motivated to make friends and discover new things outside of my own background.  This appreciation for diversity and individual choice is pretty unique in American culture.    By doing so I was able to expand my critical thinking skills because I began to understand how many solutions there can be to one problem. Learning from people who have different beliefs showed me that more often our similarities are greater than our differences and we can still have mutual respect for each other.   I love you America for demonstrating this diversity of people and thought through having a multi-cultural population and promoting education for all.

As I look to our future together America, I know there will be struggles.  Gender equality is something we will always be working for in America.  You do not pretend to have achieved it, because in reality that would mean we have given up. Your honesty about your struggles allows real grassroots change to happen.  Your people feel like they have a voice, and they have the capacity to change.  Together we are continuously developing ourselves to be more equitable and supportive.  In our future I see more women holding leadership positions, more men stepping up to help in the household duties, and more honest conversations about sex, love, and healthy relationships.  I love you America and I embrace your imperfections and look forward to developing together. 

I know I left you America, but I needed space to really appreciate the depth of what you do and the structures you have in place to provide success.  I had to leave to appreciate how much despite the struggles and frustrations, you are always willing to change.  We will be reunited in the near future, and I will embrace our time together for mutual growth.  Until then, I will continue to share the parts of you I am proud of while pointing out that we have a lot of work to do too.  Thank you for all you have given me and all the opportunities I have because of you.

Love,

Tara