A Pebble and A River — Oberlin Shansi

By Haley Sablay ‘23, Taigu Fellow 2024-2026

“What is the best piece of advice you have ever received?” read the Powerpoint slide at 11 am during a Masters class last spring semester. We were learning about giving and receiving advice, and this simple question seemed too big a feat not only for my groggy students but also for myself despite having a practiced answer the night before. (I’m a planner, what can I say?) At the time, the best advice I could muster to most of my classes was “you only live once” and then proceeded to explain the term YOLO. Looking back, I wish I had given a different answer (even though my students found the term hilarious).

Elaine, Nissa, Sidnhy, Dina, Haley, and Tiffany enjoying a Thanksgiving meal at a local restaurant

In freshman year of college, during a Geology course where I was randomly placed, my professor ended our lesson about bodies of water with, “even a pebble, as small as it is, can change the course of a river forever. No matter its placement, along the sides or dead in the center, that river is different than when the pebble wasn’t there.” And while I’m 90% sure my professor used this advice to lecture about the effect of late homework on our final grade, his unassuming message has stuck with me through college and now during my Shansi Fellowship.

While I am only a semester into this two-year experience, I have been teaching in Taigu at Shanxi Agricultural University (SXAU) for well over a year now. Too scared to leave home and everything familiar for two years right after college, I opted for a one-year contract with SXAU instead of applying for the Shansi fellowship. It was a heavy decision, marked with endlessly asking for others’ advice until my voice was drowned out by everyone else’s, so much so that I was more confused than when I initially considered the decision. Ultimately (and obviously), along the bank of the river that is my life, I tossed a pebble and moved to China.

All I did in my first year was learn and set (self-imposed) deadlines. My first time in China, first time in Asia, and many many other firsts I navigated with the assumption that there was a strict expiration date. Behind every new experience, there was a nagging underlying thought that what if this is the last time I get to do this? New experiences felt like an impossible long distance sprint, chasing one after another, without any time to calm my breath and admire the final destination or commend myself for the lengths I had gone. Looking back, it’s hard to pinpoint exactly when I knew I wanted to stay. Maybe it was the first time I admired the surrounding city with my “super senior” fellow Elaine on the roof of our 12-floor apartment building. Or maybe it was while watching elderly grandparents walk their grandchildren to school during my morning commute to class, sparking heartfelt flashbacks of when my Lola would walk my brother and I home from elementary school everyday. It could have been my first Thanksgiving abroad, celebrating with all my co-fellows in Mickey and Harper’s freezing house huddled around Mickey’s homemade chili and A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving. Or even the time when my Chinese language teacher, Francis, wished me a happy winter solstice and brought ingredients for vegetable dumplings to my then-barren apartment, the warmth of our cooking enough to cushion my heavy homesickness. There was no distinct turning point that convinced me to apply for two more years in Taigu, just an accumulation of precious memories and people I held like pebbles filling my pockets to the brim but ready to take the plunge.

Sidnhy, Tiffany, Elaine, Nissa, Dina, and Haley at Green Cafe (a favorite hangout and work spot)

Exactly one year ago, I was anxious and dizzy at the thought of leaving Taigu, new unlikely friends, my students, and my co-fellows permanently. I worried over what my last day in Taigu would be and feel like. From time to time last year, my co-fellows and I would jokingly ask each other, “on your last day in Taigu, where would you have your last meal?” And although an innocent (but impossible) question, every time I would consider and reconsider my answer, a part of me wondered if my last Taigu meal would come sooner than I had hoped for.

Now, as I write this report during the first year of this fellowship which has seen my lowest lows and highest highs, I marvel at how the river of my life curves and flows in ways I never would have expected. In the past month, I have revelled in more first-time experiences I will never forget, allowing myself to truly savor every detail. My first time in the Philippines, first time seeing the clearest and bluest water in the Pacific Ocean, first time meeting and traveling with co-fellows from different sites in both senior and junior cohorts, and so many more. As the pebbles keep piling up and my river changes course, I thank every opportunity I have had to embrace more people and more of life than I ever thought possible in this lifetime.