
THE END
For my final, my mentor asked me to create my own International Collaboration Project. The Project had two required components. First, I had to find a partner from another country to do my project with me. Second, my project had to be connected to something in the curriculum that I had studied this year.
After much brainstorming I decided that I wanted to include the following three things in my project:
1. Ralph Waldo Emerson’s Friendship Essay
2. Children
3. Elderly people
Due to connections which I had (and a sprinkle of tender mercies) I was able to find an international partner from Bulgaria. She and I each collected at least one true friendship story from a child and an elderly person from our country. After interviewing children and elderly people from our country we each wrote their stories down. When that was completed we both wrote a true short story about one of our friends. In the end, we had collected and written several friendship stories which consisted of different ages and two divergent locations (USA and Bulgaria). For the end product I designed a blog where I posted all the friendship stories, added friendship quotes by Emerson, and uploaded images portraying friendship.
During this project I asked myself if perceptions of friendship had changed over the years. Because the story-tellers were from different places and were various ages I was able to get a glimpse of what friendship was from their perspective. And since I read Emerson’s Friendship essay I gained his perspective on true friendship as well.
I gladly discovered that each of the stories which my partner and I compiled had sprinkles of truth and tenderness in them. Although I think the world has adopted an artificial and materialistic view of friendship I was relieved to see that true friendship still exists. After wrapping up my project I realized that an authentic friendship is that which is simple, sincere, and sacred.
Written by: Sarah Beals, April 25, 2009
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