I grew up without knowing that I am a third culture kid. I recently learned the term, third culture kid, in my junior year of high school. The term is used to describe individuals who are raised in a culture different than their own and their parents’ or the culture of their nationality, and also live in a culture that is significantly different in their child development years. I was raised in 6 different countries starting from Singapore, South Korea, Qatar, Kuwait, Venezuela, and Canada. I now know who I am and that was when I realized the power of storytelling. Our world is growing diverse every minute and it is only getting easier to connect with people from different backgrounds. That is when I started to have a dream of becoming a storyteller.
I believe storytelling and creativity are inseparable; one cannot achieve one thing without another. Without creativity, storytelling would lose its impact on others. On the other hand, without storytelling, creativity would go into waste. Having the power to work with storytelling and creativity is omnipotent because it is the best way to present a story that empathizes with a diverse audience. As more people are able to sympathize with the story, the creativity to present the story in the best way possible becomes fathomable.
Experiences I hope to have through my collaboration with The Creative Process are gaining storytelling skills with creativity, learning to listen to others’ stories without prejudice, acquiring interpersonal skills (active listening, asking the right questions), and most importantly, understanding others. These are essentially my goals to strive for throughout my collaboration with The Creative Process and it will be an ongoing project of mine in my life.
My one wish for the future would be the eradication of COVID-19 and the development of a vaccine for the pandemic. Everyone’s lives have been affected by the pandemic in every possible way. COVID-19 allowed us to see the true sides of many things from healthcare services to poverty. It is a constant struggle against the new virus that we don’t have the cure for and those who are fighting in the front line are the healthcare workers. The behind-the-scenes people make it possible for us to learn more about the virus and ways to take caution. As TCP is multidisciplinary and that it is actually a “portrait in words,” it is crucial that we use this platform to tell their stories and to help them raise awareness of the virus. The TCP is a powerful tool where there are no boundaries between multiple disciplines. Hence, it will be easier to tell stories that sympathize with everyone from different backgrounds.
I have a great interest in investigating stories from a social point of view. My recent projects include producing a podcast examining the social changes in Qatar comparing the experiences of working in Qatar between expatriates and Qataris. Another project that I participated in was a news package on the topic of the Kafala system in Qatar and how it is impacting the lives of workers. I plan to continue learning different storytelling techniques and methods in order for me to tell stories that are less focused on mainstream media.
Podcast Project for Northwestern https://sites.northwestern.edu/thephoenix/podcast/
News Package Project https://northwestern.app.box.com/s/7npxowa09t7xztyqzhg2nrrrkpdqcx0n
