On Adaptability

The start of my Chat Cafe last week foreshadowed the rest of the conversation. When I arrived at the UGLi lobby, admittedly only a few minutes before 3, I couldn’t find a single table to set up the circle. Soon, my participants had arrived and I sort of had to think on the fly. We all adapted to the situation and decided to go outside and sit on the grass for the hour, taking advantage of the lovely weather. I think that concept of adaptability is the most important thing that I learned last week. It came up time and time again in the conversation itself.

One of the first questions of adaptability that we all had to approach was the addition of a new member to our circle: Ting. Ting speaks English well and is completely understandable. However, it was clear that she was more hesitant to speak than the other two participants in the circle. I tried to direct questions her way, but it seemed forced and had a stifling effect on the conversation. Luckily, my circle lived up the task and adapted themselves. Ray (the philosophy major) sat close to Ting, I believe to make her feel more comfortable and welcome. Meanwhile, Martin asked her about their questions about China (where they are both from). It was exciting to watch and I look forward to seeing how Ting will continue to mesh with the rest of the circle.

After discussing our days, we went into the mock class discussion portion, for which they were all well-prepared. We talked about the article (which was about Ichiro using Spanish smack talk to intimidate and ridicule his opponents), but the discussion ultimately veered back to Ray, who expressed once again her frustration at not being able to vocalize her opinions in her philosophy classes. She wished that she could have a translator follow her around the way Ichiro does. From there, we tried to get at the aspects of the discipline that brought her to philosophy in the first place. She recommended a low level class to Martin and said, “Just wait until you talk about God, That’s the best!” A theological discussion of beliefs followed. What started as an exploration into a Wall Street Journal article had ended in one of the fundamental questions of humanity. That’s what I call adaptability.