Have you ever thought about it?

What is Global Citizenship?

Source: http://www.iearn.org/sites/default/files/filefield_uploads/global-survey2.jpg

That is an important question that came up in the beginning of our summer course. When I firstly thought about it, I felt a little bit confused about what it should be. After watch some videos explaining about it I realize that the definition of a global citizenship, in my opinion, could be as follow below.

''Global citizen is a person that belong to the world and not just a special community. It means that they want to make the difference in a global scale and not just local. The global citizens are looking at seeing the world from a different way in order to make it healthier, sustainable. Compassionate and peaceful. The youth has an incredible power to make this difference in the world. ''

How can I become a Global citizen?

That is an interesting question that everybody probably had in their minds in the begging of the course. From my point of view, to become a global citizen you must be able to see the world as a big community where everybody should work together to make it a better place to live our lives without destroying our natural resources and being also able to make connections that overcome the borders of our countries in order to make it possible.

The pictures below shown what I am trying to explain.

Source: http://www.lawfuel.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/global-citizen.jpg

Source: https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRwxtGLfPAXXlCzTki9QpSnnwwnJd2G_aXRxNF7zyoLIYt3H9pxGsGyRH6xqAeXT9Ddwu4rpcw7bBtOcGg2nwZ97WDheC7NvG_k8p9ott_ihTSMvAuKHZsYhnaLFMFnW0zsuxq-vluRA/s200/gcp-logo.gif

Those pictures above are good to show a lit bit what the Global Citizenship is composed of. It shows that does not matter what is your color of skin or your nationality, who has a global citizenship are above those terms and their identity transcends the borders of political and geography areas in order to make the world a big community.

Source: http://sitesmedia.s3.amazonaws.com/gc/files/2010/09/yogc 

The phrase above was found in the internet when I did a research about the definition of global citizenship. I agreed with that phrase however there are some points that we need to think about. First of all, is not strictly necessary to be in our country to do good things for it, I reckon that the most powerful energy of the humanity come up through our ideas that transform the world when they started to be not just in our mind but in the real time by our actions. Secondly, I think that our eyes surveying the world keep our mind working as a global citizen, because it means that we are not just thinking about our nation, but the whole nation that the term Global citizen is composed.

I hope that you guys enjoyed this publication, feel free to comment about and discuss. 

My world view plus Mind Map by Prezi

I have created one mind map of my world view.
It was a good exercise to think about what really matter for us in our life and how it has been changing our thoughts and beliefs.

http://prezi.com/mm7h_abq1tnv/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy

My world view

My history started in Brazil at the city of São Paulo in 1992. I was the second child of my mother, the first one was my sister, she is 2 years older than me. The history of my family it is full of adventure that has led to mixed cultures in the house. My parents are both from Brazil, however they have background from Europe, that is why I do not look like a Brazilian guy (following the pattern: black hair & tan skin).

The fact of have a background from another country can be useful for you or not, it is going to be up to your family. Fortunately my family always tried to bring it as a useful thing. First of all, my grandmother and my grandfather they came from Portugal and made their lives in Brazil. It would be just a normal thing in that time, cause Portugal was passing throughout financial problems in their government. However, my family tried to teach me what is the important thing about it.

Moreover, I grew up listening and discussing about the differences between the cultures of my background and it was so important to me because I started to develop an interest about the opportunities that the global citizenship can have. Furthermore, all the difficult times that my family passed throughout led me to build my thoughts as a man earlier than the usual.

Since I was a kid I always had interest in how to build the things, it led me to get in a course of Engineering in Brazil. Being a student it is always good for learn new things and build your knowledge. Since I got in the university I have passed through a lot of experiences that changed my thoughts and my behavior. One of the best experiences that I have got was the scholarship from my government. I am a part of the program called by Science Without Borders. I came to Australia as an exchange student for 17 months. I have been here for 10 months and since the first day I have met a lot of people from everywhere in the world. It is being so useful for me, every person that I have met I learned something new about their cultures. Now, I am living in a huge house with 32 people from different countries. I can easily say that I am changing every day, it is shaping my mind.

My housemates

This experience in Australia is showing to me that our thoughts, behavior and knowledge, they are related to the culture that we have experienced. My view of the world now is different than when I was in Brazil. I understand that the culture have influence in our view of the world, our values and beliefs. Another important thing to point out it is about the differences of each culture. For example, the Chinese have a different calendar. In the first moment that you see something really different than your reality the feeling it is weird but after few words explaining about that you start to accept it as something that can bring to you knowledge and maybe change your thoughts and beliefs. For example, when I saw my friend from china drinking warm water I was feeling so weird, but then they explained to me that it is common in China and it is consider as a healthy practice of them. The friendship make the world better, sharing experiences and cultures even though whether differences are strong or not.

I would like to say that the fact of being living with so many people it is the best experience that someone can have about learning cultures. The cultural connections that it has bring to me it is building who I am now. The respect, the interest of learning and the adventure, are words that come together in a peaceful experience living with so many different cultures.

My first post

Hello everyone, my name is Airton. I'm from brazil and currently I'm living in Sydney.

I have created this blog for show my thoughts and ideas about the Global Citizenship.

I hope  you enjoy, feel free to contact me for any question or suggestion.

Thank you,