Little Body, Huge Heart - Sunday, 6/24 (Jazmyn Davis)

If there was one part of China I could bring back to the US, it would be the willingness and excitement to learn from and engage with people of different cultures. Only on week one, our group has been approached by many Chinese strangers. All of these individuals have wanted to take pictures of, or with us and multiple have engaged in conversation. By far, my favorite experience with a native has happened to be with a five year old boy. Lydia and I were walking around Lakeside park when we discovered a pavilion. Intrigued, we approached the and took a few pictures. We continued to scope out the area before returning to the pavilion.

As we walked past, we could hear a small yet assertive voice say “apples”. I turned to see a young boy repeat the word apples then tell me he’s 5.  As I listened to him impress me with all of the english words he could say, a big smile crept across my face. “Airplane, Juice, Bananas” (which he pronounced bananers, so cute!).
His father who spoke seemingly perfect english explained to us that the boy was learning english and he was excited to practice with new people who speak the language.
As we took pictures with this boy I showed him how a polaroid worked, which he quickly fell in love with. He waved his arm back and forth as fast as he could taking short breaks to see how the picture had developed. I ended up giving him one of the polaroids that he seemed to like very much. He said thank you so many times and was truly a man of manners.
I will take this little boys eagerness and big smile with me everywhere that I go and I can’t wait to tell this story many times again.