Hello, Bonjour, Do mae dian, good day, guttan tag, kunichiwa, chao, shallom, hola, ni hao
Hello to all of the children of the world!We're all the same in more ways than we know
We speak in many different ways
Though some things might be different, we're people just the same
And we all like to sing and play
Hello, Bonjour, Do mae dian, good day, guttan tag, kunichiwa, chao, shallom, hola, ni hao
Hello to all of the children of the world!
That was sing along time, with Doris!
I just woke up from a nap (sometimes I just got to get away) and that song from like my 3rd grade chorus recital just came to me! It used to be one of my favorite songs. It really explains a lot about the way I am, and how my growing up in a place that encouraged us to take an interest in learning about other types of people, and had us sing such songs really bread tolerance in us kids.
I often complain about the lack of diversity in Pittsburgh, because where I grew up (Andrews Air Force Base, Maryland) there were no such clear lines of segregation. I mean everyone was just together, your neighbors and classmates were of all types of different races. It was not a shock at all to see people that looked different than you, and each other, it felt like there were no minorities because there was just a mixed bunch of kids. There was not mostly one race and then some others, like what is common here in Pittsburgh and probably just about everywhere outside of the Air Force bubble.
Anyways, my point is, it is sad :-( I know for a fact that discrimination and hate are taught traits. Kids don't know that being different is something worthy of being treated different until someone (usually their parents) teaches them. As kids in Maryland, when we got new neighbors who were an interratial married couple, we simply thought, "you two look different from each other, can we play with your puppy now?" When my parents' black friends adopted a fillipino boy, all we thought was, "is he our age?" so that he could play with us. When I found out that my Mexican friend spoke spanish I wasn't all, "speak English what are you saying?" I more like bothered him to say more and had him teach me his spanish name because it was interesting that he shared something new with me. None of us kids knew to be racist against different people because we weren't raised that way.
Then I moved to Pittsburgh in middle school. It was a whole new world. There were clearly mostly black and mostly white areas, and you would have to be super lucky to see any "other" races in class, let alone in your neighborhood. It was an interesting change to see how people "stuck with their own kind" very often here. Not really in a racist way, put in a "that's just what is done" kind of way. But here is where I learned that racism and discrimination really does still exist.
Now I am an adult, so I watch the news (sometimes) and see so much discrimination against race, sexual orientation, the amount of money you have, and it is all just disgusting! I've recently started learning Korean and with it am learning more and more about how racist some Koreans are. I've also been catching up on the last season of RuPaul's Drag Race. Which of course comes with the stories of how much hate these men got growing up for being gay, and for wanting to dress up like women and entertain us. Pennsylvania just legalized same sex marriage and I have been hearing a lot of hateful things because of that too and I'M JUST OVER ALL THE HATE!
I hate, hate! So maybe that's why that song from my 3rd grade recital came back to me. Let's all have fun singing the song and stop hating and being rude to people just because they're different. Everyone being the same would be way too boring!
Reprise!
Hello, Bonjour, Do mae dian, good day, guttan tag, kunichiwa, chao, shallom, hola, ni hao
Hello to all of the children of the world!We're all the same in more ways than we know
We speak in many different ways
Though some things might be different, we're people just the same
And we all like to sing and play
Hello, Bonjour, Do mae dian, good day, guttan tag, kunichiwa, chao, shallom, hola, ni hao
Hello to all of the children of the world!
Anyone have stories of hate that they want to get off their chest? Oh and feel free to correct me if I remembered any of the other languages wrong.
