Harold Rice,
Ann Arbor, MI.
On Location: University of Michigan

The University of Michigan has the 8th most international students in the country, which causes all of it’s students to be both accepting and interactive with cultures far different from their own. I came to the university from a town that was 99% white, and I had only one friend in high school who wasn’t Caucasian. This was not because I did not like other races; it was simply that I had never been exposed to differing cultures before. However, as soon as I got to Michigan, my first two friends, one of whom is now my best friend, were of Asian descent. In Ann Arbor I am not only shown many different races, but different cultures are everywhere in town. For example, there is food from every region of the world in about 4 square blocks. Also, because Ann Arbor is such a liberal place, it has given me a much more open mind set of why people’s behaviors are so different, and to be accepting of all people. I was also brought to this realization through a history course that I took this year. The class was about perceptions of maps and magic in Southeast Asian culture, and it showed me that some western ideas are just as far out there as the rest of the worlds, but because it is all I was exposed to, I thought it was normal behavior. All in all, all people have different beliefs because of their cultures, but the world would be a much better place if we would accept one another’s ideas rather than starting wars over them.