Weekly Overview 1/30

This last week in class we talked about monochronic time and polychromic time. We started discussing which countries were classified under each time. You don’t ever really think about things like these until they are brought up. The United States is classified under polychromic time. It’s funny that after this class I noticed how much that is true. We cannot even drive here without trying to operate our cell phones, check our hair, do our makeup, change the song on the radio and cuss out the person who cut us off all at the same time. I feel everyone is so impatient and everything has to be done all at once here. Then I realized this place could probably be a lot less stressed out if we would just take the time and do things the right, and safe, way.

We also started talking about racism, othering, discrimination, prejudice and all the things that go hand in hand with these topics. There is a lot of hate in the United States and other countries and there is so many different things that people are like the ones that I just named. I don’t get how people can hate someone or some race so bad when they don’t even know their backgrounds and who they truly are! It’s like when people see people with tattoos and automatically think that they are bad people and mean and disrespectful which most of the time isn’t true. Just because people like to express themselves differently or look different doesn’t give other people the right to judge. You may have your own personal opinions but those are your opinions, not a universal opinion!  The video we are watching is one that is kind of hard to watch at moments. Not that they show what happened but listening to how these people were tortured because they were different is horrifying. It’s something that you never want to hear happening in your hometown.

My Family

My family originates from many different countries. I have many different cultures that make up me. I am mainly German, Russian and Norwegian. But I am also Irish and Swedish as well. My Great Grandma and Grandpa on my mom's side grew up in Germany. They came to America after my Grandma was born. My Great Grandma still has a very VERY thick German accent and it's funny but sometimes hard to handle! My mom's dad is full Norwegian which explains a lot of the things I do that I don't even think about. On my dad's side of the family they are mainly German and Norwegian. Although I did find out that my Great Grandpa has some Irish and Swedish in him too which I think(my thoughts are always right, right?) that that is where my blue eyes come from and the reddish tint my hair has comes from too! I do feel like I have little characteristics about me that give off each part of where my family comes from!

Last Name

This past week in class we were asked to find out where our last name originated. So when I went home this weekend I asked my dad. He told me that my last name, which is Hornberger, originated from Germany. I then found out that there is a little town by the name of Hornberger located in Germany which I thought was pretty cool! I didn't really find out anything else but I do think that it is kind of interesting to know that my last name is a town!

Overview of the Week

One of the things that I learned this week is that just because something is custom in our country, doesn't mean that people from other countries share that same custom. We learned that just because someone looks like they may be one thing doesn't mean that they are! This kind of stuck with me because of what we are going through here in Williston and in other parts of North Dakota right now. I have become very frustrated because where I work we have a lot of foreign people here on a work exchange trip that come in to the bank. With the language barrier it is hard to understand what they are trying to tell you or ask you and that makes things extremely difficult when you are trying to answer their questions correctly. I really hadn’t thought about the fact that they are from a different country and that just as we cannot understand them, they also cannot understand us. I think that this week kind of put things in a different perspective for me. I learned that I do need to be more patient with things when all I am being is frustrated.

            With this oil boom and the town being overpopulated all of the people that are originally from are all becoming very frustrated very fast, including me. And even though most people are just from another state, things are also different from the way we do things as well. Just as we have to adjust to them being here, they also need to adjust into coming into a new place as well. They basically have taken over the town and they do not realize that not everything will change for them to make them feel at home. It is our home too and has been for a while so the natives in this town are refusing to budge which is causing a lot of controversy. I think that these situations tie in perfectly with what we began talking about even if it isn’t about other countries.

My Goals

One of the goals that I hope to get from this class is to better understand the different cultures that make up me. I know where my relatives came from and I know bits and pieces of history that happened in those countries but I don't really know much about why those places came to be. My other goal is to be able to speak up more and not get so nervous to talk in front of people that I am not familiar with. I can never get over my nerves when it comes to getting up and giving a presentation in front of everybody, especially when it is something that I have to memorize.