PART 2 : CINCINNATI, OH + ELSEWHERE / 01.2015 - 05.2015
Over Spring Break, I was fortunate enough to volunteer with Serve Beyond Cincinnati and travel to Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota. We worked with community members of the Oglala Lakota tribe, and also heard firsthand stories of life on the reservation from local elders of the tribe. We assisted local families by helping install skirting on trailers and constructing outhouses. During these construction tasks, I was able to take on a leadership role because of my architecture knowledge and construction experience. I helped show the other volunteers how to construct these temporary solutions for families living in poverty on the reservation.
While on the reservation, we learned a lot about the injustices that the Lakota community have had to suffer with because of broken promises by the U.S. government. We looked at the site of the massacre of 1812, where a memorial gateway is erected with a list of the broken treaties. After witnessing the poverty and hearing of the high rates of suicide and alcoholism on the reservation, it is hard to reconcile the evidence with the belief that they have been treated fairly. It is shocking that this state of poverty exists, almost as a separate entity, within the United States.
As volunteers, I found it hard to truly appreciate that what we were doing was going to make a difference, especially when compared to all the other difficult circumstances on the ranch. Because I do have a construction background, I did find it hard to overlook the craft issues that we had as volunteers in building things that would be heavily used by families. However, looking back, I realize that the trip was just as much as them helping us, in terms of overcoming ignorance through education and firsthand travels to different sites around the reservation. This experience has definitely broadened the perspective I had and made me realize that our education cannot not fully come from the classroom or one view; rather it must be a collection of all possible views and experiences.
While on the reservation, we learned a lot about the injustices that the Lakota community have had to suffer with because of broken promises by the U.S. government. We looked at the site of the massacre of 1812, where a memorial gateway is erected with a list of the broken treaties. After witnessing the poverty and hearing of the high rates of suicide and alcoholism on the reservation, it is hard to reconcile the evidence with the belief that they have been treated fairly. It is shocking that this state of poverty exists, almost as a separate entity, within the United States.
As volunteers, I found it hard to truly appreciate that what we were doing was going to make a difference, especially when compared to all the other difficult circumstances on the ranch. Because I do have a construction background, I did find it hard to overlook the craft issues that we had as volunteers in building things that would be heavily used by families. However, looking back, I realize that the trip was just as much as them helping us, in terms of overcoming ignorance through education and firsthand travels to different sites around the reservation. This experience has definitely broadened the perspective I had and made me realize that our education cannot not fully come from the classroom or one view; rather it must be a collection of all possible views and experiences.