Lessons from Angelo: Learning to Fly

Lessons from Angelo

Angelo lived in a tree house. Not the kind that you had to climb a ladder into with sheets as  windows and you camp out with your friends on warm summer nights that are filled with buzzing fire flies. Not the kind with the safety of going inside if you get too scared, but a real tree house. The kitchen and bathroom were built around the trunk and up the stairs off a deck and built into the branches was a bedroom. Small and simple, but a well loved and unique hide away.

In the gazebo that was nestled below the hanging branches and over a pond, the embers glowed from the grill that would cook our dinner of clams and Thai BBQ. Amidst the friendly hula hoop contests, clanging bottles of beer Chang and Sangsum, the live classic rock strum from guitars of relaxed boys in hammocks. Someone would then start the singing of Radio Head and The Eagles and this is how it went until the early morning hours.

This is what I think of when I think of Thailand. Music. Whether it’s on the beach with the pink dolphins as an audience and the waves keeping tempo, to a simple western style living room. This is what defined us. And it fit Angelo, as did his tree house.

Angelo was a tree. His trunk planted firmly in the ground in the knowledge of his identity, his life, his loves and his beliefs. In the word “REVOLUTION” that was permanently inked diagonally across his entire torso. In his firm stubborn affirmation that the Bears would ALWAYS beat the Vikings…always.

His arms had the wingspan of an eagle, like branches they stretched out to the world. Showing love and acceptance to all he encountered. At times it seemed Angelo had hundreds of arms, as a tree has branches. The sun was his life source and I often picture Angelo, arms spread wide to the sky, eyes closed to the heavens, smiling as the sun beams its warmth into his body and fills him to the brim.

Angelo encompasses the concept of “risk” perfectly. There is a saying that if you fail to take risks, your life will deteriorate. This can be seen in the athletic world. If an athlete fails to take risks, to step to the next level, his body will deteriorate. If a student fails to take risks of challenging themselves academically to the next level, their brain will deteriorate. My grandmother, even into her 90’s, never watched TV, she only did crosswords and read books because she was always pushing herself, taking the risk of the next level mentally. She had her mind complete when her health failed her.

This can be seen of Angelo as well. Angelo would always pick play fights and make bets. Angelo would challenge authority with a respectful tact. Angelo would never hesitate to ask questions of every single person he came into contact with, just so he could learn more.

I remember when I was finishing my lunch in the cafeteria and talking to a couple colleagues, Angelo came and sat right across from me and with a chicken BBQ lined mouth interrupted with a, “so human trafficking, huh?” It was something he didn’t know much about, but he knew I did. So to challenge himself and take a risk, he asked to learn more.

There are other more complex aspects of risks and challenges that we can learn from the life of Angelo. That is the risk to live without fear. So often in life we have grand ideas, big plans for adventure. Yet somewhere along the way, someone reminds us of this little thing called “safety.” In the western world, this is something that consumes us. Bike helmets, rounded playgrounds,side airbags, the list goes on and on.

We forget then the risk that we were so excited about, the one that made us come alive, and in turn we go back to our complacent life. But a complacent life without risk leads to stagnancy and deterioration, not growth. How will you ever know if you can fly, unless you take the risk and try. We will never know our full potential, what we are capable of, or the type of impact we can have on the world, unless we try. I’m sure mother Theresa has thought about the safety issues that concern the work she did in the red light districts, the orphanages, and the leper colonies, but she took that risk, and changed the world simply by being present where others wouldn’t. Where others told her it was “unsafe.”

In my time in Thailand, everyone took risks. It was a risk to simply walk to school and hope to not get hit by a motorcycle. It was a risk to cross a rickety old bridge made of uneven twigs elevated on nothing but large jagged rocks. It was a risk to eat. It was a risk for me to go into nightclubs and form relationships with the bar girls, and it was a risk to play with the street kids while they were supposed to be selling flowers to support their parents alcohol addiction at 2am. Yet these were all risks that everyone was willing to take in order to push themselves, to search for something bigger, to see if they could fly.

The childlike risk that the street children took in order to be a kid and have the freedom to play was embodied daily by Angelo.  Angelo was taking a risk the day he climbed the steep jungle path to make it to the top tier of the waterfall. I can picture his reaction as he slipped and plummeted down the rocky waterfall was not that of fear, but that of adventure. And I know for a fact that Angelo would not have regretted the risk he took that day. For in that risk, he learned to fly. Canon T3i 18.0MP Digital SLR Camera with 18-55mm IS Lens - Digital (Google Affiliate Ad)

It's time we all embraced risk and learned to fly.

Human Trafficking Awareness Month

This past month has been declared by Obama to be Human Trafficking Awareness Month. This raises the question of how aware we really are. I am a firm believer that the first step to change in any situation, is to become aware that it is a problem, and that there is a logical and plausible solution. While some people take this knowledge and create radical change in the world, others simply shove it to the back of the files in their brain as if it doesn’t affect them. Out of sight, out of mind.

Human trafficking is a $32 billion dollar industry, the fasted growing criminal enterprise in the world, and the only reason it exists is because there is a demand for it. Not only abroad in those third world developing nations that are ravaged by war, famine and corruption, but here in the United States, here in my hometown, here at my job.

What exactly is Human Trafficking? It is slavery, Plain and simple, People doing work that is forced, undesirable, for little or no pay. It’s often glamorized by Hollywood as being an industry that is run by mob bosses who want to get rich quick, and while this is true, it is not the most realistic scenario. While some people are tricked or kidnapped into the industry, others go willingly, thinking they will easily be able to pay the debt, and their family, who knows exactly where their child is going for the sake of immediate economic gain, sells some. This one being sold is referred to as, “the sacrificial lamb.” Often times the victim knows their fate, but knowingly accepts it for a variety of reasons, depending on the region of the world and religion. And traffickers aren’t always mob bosses.

The truth is, anyone could be a trafficker. The boy who sits next to you in Algebra, the mother next door, the mayor, your boyfriend who seems like he’s the “sweetest guy in the world.” Along with anyone being a trafficker, anyone could be trafficked. Unlike slavery of the past, this modern form does not discriminate on race, gender, age, or socio-economic standing. And it doesn’t only include forced prostitution, which by the way, the overwhelming majority of prostituted individuals and strippers did not start out doing that “career” willingly. Trafficking can be anything from prostitution, stripping, bonded labor, the people who mine your diamonds, the people who catch your shrimp, the people who harvest your cocoa, the materials in your laptop, phone, or iPad, child soldiers, sometimes even wives, the list goes on and on. Slavery is everywhere in everyone’s lives.

Being a teacher, I come across various victims of trafficking quite often. Students tell me stories about their past, their family, or things that have happened to them here in the United States, and it shocks me that people don’t care more about this issue, as it does in fact “affect you.” These people who are trafficked are somebody’s daughters, somebody’s sons, somebody’s sisters or brother, somebody’s cousin, or like me, somebody’s students.

I could spit out a bunch of facts and numbers that are appalling and disturbing, I could tell you stories of first hand accounts, and stories that have been passed through organizations of those victims who were lucky enough to be rescued, but instead I will leave you with a poem that was written by a student of mine, right here in Minnesota.

The assignment was to write about the most significant thing that happened in your life

And before he even thought about it, he furiously slammed his pencil to paper, writing so fast that smoke emitted from where the lead pushed on the crisp lines

His tongue stuck out the side of his mouth in concentration and the pencil flew

And in his broken English he wrote:

These hands show the scars of many lives

Lives taken and one given back

For you see these burns like gloves

And I see my life in flashback

A village burned, a family mourned,

A blunt force, and broken dreams

A boy cries, a girl dies,

A woman in the distance screams

I see these rings around my wrist and remember being captured

These men that burned my village,

Also tortured,

Murdered,

Battered

I see a pinch from an AK47 that in 30 minutes I learned to master at the age of eight,

For it was be killed,

Or go faster

And then one day I ran,

That’s where the story changes

For now these hands, these burns, these scars don’t mean regret, but second chances

Of a life long past but not forgotten,

 Of redemption earned,

Of freedom gotten

For the first time in my life, I get to go to school,

I eat I laugh I play.

I don’t worry if someone will kill me,

 I have a home at the end of the day.

for more information on Human Trafficking, the signs, or how you can help, here is a list of websites that can help you:

http://www.notforsalecampaign.org

http://www.state.gov/j/tip/rls/tiprpt/

http://Love146.org 

http://www.polarisproject.org

http://www.ijm.org