By Satkar Karki
BBA Student at King’s College
“If you put all these possibilities to follow the people, to know where they are, and what they are doing. If you put all these tools to the bad end, it can be very bad; and that’s my opinion. But I understand today, portables are necessary and are popular amongst the young generation to communicate.”
– Eric Dagnac
Eric doesn’t have a cellphone, and haven’t used it till now. He is very good at playing FIFA. He is a responsible father of two children, and is quite young to catch up to the smartphone technology. However, he disagrees. He believes the virtual device will reduce the actual relationship with his family, relatives, and friends. He discourages the use of cellphone while sitting at the dinner table, but comes up with a lot of bad and good jokes while dinner. I met the happy Dagnac family in Toulouse, south of France where we were invited to attend a cultural student exchange program. The family of four, Eric (father), Helene (mother), Thomas (eldest son), and Romain (youngest son) were very hospitable and kind to me; during my week-long stay at Tournefeuille, Toulouse.
A group of six students pursuing their BBA from Kings College set on their journey to Europe for 21 days to attend a program held at College Labitrie, Tournefeullie, France to mark the death anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr. There were delegates from Romania, Colombia, Poland, Ukraine and India who presented about the prevalence of racism which still existed in their respective nation. Racism was nothing unusual. People all around the world are still discriminated on the basis of their caste, ethnicity, religion, pigment, economic status, and political ideologies. Just like Martin, every delegates had their dream and agreed upon working together to find solution-based ideas to fight and abolish racism.
We were divided into several groups in such a way that each member from the group belonged to a different country. While working together for presentation or at a certain workshop, there were barriers making us difficult to collaborate. However, over time we could come up as a team and tackle issues diligently. My group was assigned to discuss on the discrimination faced by homosexuals. We would spend hours discussing the problems faced by homosexuals in each of our country, compare the differences; and try to work on a possible solution which would allow the homosexuals to live in harmony.
Besides that, we also had an opportunity to visit and tour the Airbus factory in Toulouse, which is one of the leading aeronautical manufacturing company producing hundreds of airplanes, helicopters, and military aeronautical products in the world. The operational process of the factory was amazing, and the efficiency of the whole operations process was top-notch which made us realize how advance the world has become.
Throughout these three weeks in Europe, we got to travel four different nations (France, Belgium, Netherlands, and Germany); where we’d meet a lot of new people. We’d share our experiences, make new friends, and get positive takeaways from the entire trip. I’d like to convey my grateful thanks to the college administration and our faculty, Ms. Upasna Acharya for accompanying us to this wonderful trip and providing this amazing platform to grow as an individual and team-player.
