They Said my Head was Weird

Before I left on my trip to the Cheyenne River Reservation in Eagle Butte, South Dakota, I found out that I would be interacting with the children and teenagers that frequent the activities organized by the Cheyenne River Youth Project. Today, I am blogging about my experience with the little kids. To be honest, I came into this whole thing with stereotypes and expectations. I had no idea how the little kids would behave around me. I kind of expected them to behave all proper-like because they came from a Native American reservation. I realize now that that thinking was ridiculous and stereotype reinforcing. I went into this experience believing something that I had no evidence for believing. And I believe this sort of made me ill-prepared for what went down when I interacted with the little kids.

As I came to find out, the little kids I met on the reservation were no different than little Chinese, Russian, German, or American kids. These kids were brutal. Because they did not refrain from speaking their mind, they pretty much said anything about you to your face. They made no attempts to hide that they were bored or that they were hungry or that they disliked what was cooked for them. They pretty much acted like my little sister when she was seven. I’m not saying that I didn't like interacting with these kids. What I am saying is that they tended to act like any other group of kids from 4-12 years of age which made any sort of interaction difficult. Once again, this isn't taking away from my experience. There were a plethora of things I enjoyed about interacting with the little kids.

One thing I enjoyed about working with the kids is that they enjoyed learning or playing games. Each of the days that I was there, some people in our group were teaching some sort of lesson to the little kids. One day the lesson concerned science while another day the lesson concerned around the world topics. The little kids were eager about each day’s lesson which is more than I can say for the teenagers. Another thing I enjoyed about working with the kids is that it brought out the kid in me. I had an enormous amount of fun during those five days. I laughed a lot which I hadn't done in quite a while. The kids were brutal, and they would not hesitate to beat you up if they got the chance, but they were a pleasure to interact with which is part of what made this experience worth it.

I know that when I describe these Lakota children, it sounds a great deal like American children. This is because I didn't get a whole lot out of the children in terms of their culture. This was definitely not the case with the teenagers, but I will get to that tomorrow. What I think this means is that being a kid is (Or should be) a universal thing. Little kids like to have fun, they do not refrain from saying what they are thinking, and they like to explore the unknown. Perhaps the reason I didn’t get a great deal of understanding about their culture form them was because they were not that different from any other group of children. Yes, most of them were Lakota, and they grew up on a reservation, but just because someone is from a different race or ethnicity, that does not necessarily mean they have to be different than you. I guess that’s the important lesson I took away from the children. A different race or ethnicity does not mean drastic differences in other areas of life.