Antonieta Portillo – Reflection Piece

My name is Antonieta Portillo, or to the 360+ group, I am known as Shorty. I am 17 years old, and I am from Santa fe, new Mexico. The reason I applied for the 360+ Leadership Collective is because it gave me a great opportunity to learn about another culture outside of the US.

When I found out I had been selected to go, my reaction was excitement and nervousness. I felt excited and nervous because I was one out of about 50 other young adults chosen to go on this trip. I was nervous because the trip consisted of 3 weeks, which means I was going to be away from my family, something I had never done before. What I expected in India was crowded streets because its population is over 1.2 billion people.

In India, the most amazing experiences for me were the Taj Mahal, gandhi Ashram, and getting to know my peers. The Taj Mahal was an amazing experience because the Taj mahal wasbuilt in 22 years and it involved 20,000 workers. I can’t really explain the feeling I had when I first saw the Taj. All I can say is that is “beautiful”. When I saw the Taj it was a dream come true, because for years I dreamed of someday visiting it, but never thought I would actually have the chance.

As I said, the Taj is very beautiful because it was built with great detail. The way it was built is interesting because it was buildt according to Islamic architecture. The monuments and structure and design is unique because its structure is an octagon which allows cool breeze to be felt form the outside.

The Gandhi Ashram was another amazing experience because I was able to see Gandhi’s home. His home also represented the Indian freedom struggle. The indian struggle is seen in his home when you first learn that his home was the main place from where Gandhi led the salt march on 12, march 1930. This was an astonishing experinece because Gandhi is such a noible and humble man that his technique to deal with the british was non violence. His home also gave a feeling of peacefulness the whole time I was there. It was also really cool stepping on ground that gandhi had stepped on.

getting to slowly meet my peers is also another stunning experience because when you first meet people you have first impressions that you later find out were not true. For example, I thought my now friend Arianna was mean because she has at times a very serious face. i also thought that francisco was cocky but he is definitely not. It was also fun learning that I was not the only one with wrong first impressions.

The monument and Gandhi Ashram helped me see several differences and similarities between the US and India. One similarities that I was able to see is that each monument, museum, memorials built in these two different countries is that each has their own story and meaning behind it.

Another similarity about the monuments in both countries is that people are allowed to go out to these places although there maybe some restrictions such as not being able to take any photographs.

One difference that I was able to see is that when we went to the Taj Mahal there were many men trying to sell you things, and were persistent on trying to get your attention on buying the things they were trying to sell. This is a difference because I had not experienced something like this. These experiences helped me learn about global citizenship because now not only know about my own cities culture but now I also know a little more about India’s history and culture. I was able to learn about an important leader of non-violence, Gandhi, when we visited his house. I was also able to see how we would thread and learned that even when he was at meetings with the british he would weave because it became a symbol of independence. It’s symbolized independence because he wanted to let people know that people can be masters of their own destiny and did not need the British to master them.