Please don't refresh this page.
We are submitting all your information.
This takes few seconds.
It will redirect after submission.
We are submitting all your information.
This takes few seconds.
It will redirect after submission.
“You probably think the quality of our people is pretty low,” my new friend said humbly when she heard that our family had moved to her village for my husband to do field research on their ethnic group. We were washing dishes in the community kitchen after a memorial festival honoring their Sufi founder.
“Not at all,” I replied with surprise. “I think you are an incredible people.”
We got interrupted at that point, so I was unable to share with her all that I had grown to appreciate. I figured that because her wrong assumption would probably pop up again, I wanted to be ready with a mental list of all the beauty I had observed, so I could affirm it.
My own people, otherwise known as Americans, do not have a reputation for humility, so by contrast this is one of the first traits I take note of in other people groups when I see it.
“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.” Philippians 2:3-4
Adding to humility, I also noted how everyone in this community plays a clear and important role in their memorial festivals, where they feed up to 5,000 people.
They have a strong sense of community: like one big family looking out for and supporting each other.
They teach their children by example the importance of serving. Kids learn early on that the world does not revolve around them.
Children also learn the importance of respecting their elders. At their memorial festivals, I observed young ones serving food and waiting for the older ones to begin eating.
They invite community members and imams who don’t belong to their Sufi order to pray and eat with them, demonstrating how willing they are to overlook differences in beliefs because of the high value they place on unity.
They were incredibly hospitable and honoring toward us, as foreigners of a different faith, to live in their community.
Truly, I believe that we were blessed by more goodness and beauty during our time in
the village than we brought with us.
How do you think people in your host country would describe people of your passport country?
I felt like the stereotype I was fighting against as an American woman, living among the Muslim minority people in central western China, was from what they saw in Hollywood movies: loose, loud, and immoral. I found that covering my head, as well as my arms and legs, helped people's initial impression of me to be more positive.