Greetings and Happy Midweek!
And it’s just a tad before mid-month, so it’s time for another of our RAP sessions (Review and Process, deeper and wider). Each of these mid-month RAP sessions revisits a cross-cultural theme or topic from a previous Connect, going more deeply into what we’ve begun to explore.
This week I want to reflect on trains and training, as we revisit cross-cultural transformations which is one essential component of our Global SKILLs PROACTive strategies.* Check out several related transformative topics in previous Connects.**
I titled this Connect “TRAIN-ing” to highlight the real life activity of taking a train to somewhere, while also considering ‘training’ as a transformative experience. I have loved trains & train travel, it seems, my whole life. I grew up listening to the train whistles in the valley below where I lived - and remember dreaming about where those trains and the people on them were headed - such endless adventures! I have traveled myself on many trains to many places - delighting in seeing the world pass by while meeting and sharing stories and experiences with fellow passengers. I’ve had train trips disrupted by melted tracks, and stepped off a train into knee deep snow during a blizzard. Most recently, I have booked a 4 day cross-country train adventure which I’ve been dreaming about for years and am now really looking forward to such a marvelous TRAIN-ing experience!
The transformative nature of all cross-cultural TRAIN-ing comes in when we allow ourselves to fully enter into a context, heeding the import of a quote I heard recently (while on an historic steam engine train trip), “train whistles are the sound of history and the call of heritage”. History, heritage, transformation…exciting, right?!
How about you ~ what is one transformative TRAIN-ing experience you have had? Share about that with a friend or note it here.
And check out the Global SKILLs LINKs below for more on TRAIN-ing…
Thanks for being part of this Connect community.
Until next week, Betsy
Global SKILLs LINKs
~ talk about history & heritage…my great grandfather worked on the team who designed parts of the first transcontinental train in Latin America - here are some modern day TRAINing adventures in that region which you can enjoy virtually: https://www.wanderlust.co.uk/content/best-train-journeys-south-america/
~ the TRAIN-ing I’ll be doing in October from California to Pennsylvania: https://www.amtrak.com/california-zephyr-train
~ a TRAINing adventure which didn’t bode well…but had a happy ending: https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/chance-encounters-couple-met-broken-train-cmd/index.html
Notes:
* PROACTive Learning Strategies: PRO = PROfile, PROcess, PROgram
ACT = Application, Collaboration and Transformation (which we explored today)
~ contact me for more information on these strategies and how you might use them in your current programming
** Previous Connect Posts here with related topics on transformative cross-cultural experiences : 9/30/20 - Moving; 11/4/20 - Opportunities; 12/23/20 - Connect; 2/10/21 - World
2022 ~ Celebrating 40+ years of working in
intercultural communications and global community building
“It takes a community to build a community”
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