Travel Reference
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This family has the Sri Lankan Dream.
I was raised thinking the world is a pyramid with the United States on top and every-
body else trying to get there. Well into my adulthood, I actually believed that if another
country didn't understand that they should want to be like us, we had every right to go in
and elect a government for them that did.
While I once unknowingly cheered on cultural imperialism, travel has taught me that
one of the ugliest things one nation can do is write another nation's textbooks. Back in
the Cold War, I had a Bulgarian friend who attended an English-language high school in
Sofia. I read his Soviet-produced textbooks, which were more concerned about ideology
than teaching. He learned about “economics” with no mention of Adam Smith. And I've
seen what happens when the US funds the publishing of textbooks in places such as El
Salvador and Nicaragua, with ideological strings attached. The economics of a banana re-
public are taught in a way that glorifies multinational corporation tactics and vilifies her-
oes of popular indigenous movements. I think most Americans would be appalled if we
knew how many textbooks we're writing in the developing world.
On the road, you learn that ethnic underdogs everywhere are waging valiant but seem-
ingly hopeless struggles. When assessing their tactics, I remind myself that every year on
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