After a long day of traveling the last thing I wanted to do was sit in a workshop and listen to someone talk all day. However, Yari's presentation was amazing. We started the day with looking at the map of Alaska and where all of the different tribes are located. I did not know that Russia was so close to some of the small Alaskan islands so it was interesting to me to see that some of the tribes had such close ties with Russia. After, looking at the map we watched some short videos about cultures of the tribes. This was nice because then we could relate to some of the information that Yari was telling us in her presentation. It was also nice because then I was able to learn about the culture of the village that I was going to visit before I went. Yari's presentation was my favorite part of the day. She was so interesting. I have never met anyone so open to talk about their culture. She made me think about my culture in different ways. She almost made me feel bad that I did not have a cool culture. With my Grandparents gone it seems like my families culture has almost vanished. It took a lot for me to think of one picture that described my culture and even when I did I was not really proud of it. Yari was so proud and happy to be who she is which I think is amazing. She has strong spiritual values which I am always searching for. Her positive vibes radiated around the room. At first, when she started doing healing on the classmates I was skeptical and although I do not believe the same things as her I think that her positive energy and passion healed all of us in a way. Another part of the day that I loved was looking at all of the different homes that the villages have. I complain about how small my room is in Duluth and some of the houses that multiple people live in are not much bigger than my room. Another, thing that amazed me was how clever each tribe was to use the resources that the land offered them. I would never think of the things that they do such as leaving space between the boards in the house for flooding purposes. I respect that they do not waste anything. I hate that our culture is such a wasting culture. It always breaks my heart to see people waste food, clothes and other resources. Stewardship is a very important Benedictine value and the native tribes use their resources wise. Overall, I feel like the cultural awareness workshop made me a better person and I am excited to get more emerged in Native Alaskan culture throughout my trip.
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